Quagmire Deepens for Gonzales
The crumb trail of evidence in the U.S. attorney firing scandal leads ever more convincingly to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales following today’s testimony by his ex-chief of staff, Kyle Sampson. According to Sampson, both Gonzales and Harriet Miers, President Bush’s former counsel, “approved” and “signed off on” the plan to oust the eight federal prosecutors.
New York Times:
Responding to questions from Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., Sampson rejected the notion that the dismissals were ordered by young or inexperienced Justice Department officials.
“The decision makers in this case were the attorney general and the counsel to the president,” he told the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Gonzales and Miers were deeply involved for two years in discussions about which prosecutors to fire, according to Sampson’s testimony and e-mails released by the Justice Department.