Connecting the Dots
by Glynn Wilson

After spending a good part of the day Tuesday studying the U.S. attorneys response to the motion for a new trial filed in federal court by former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman and HealthSouth founder Richard Scrushy, I re-watched The Other Boleyn Girl film on Encore last night.

As many long-time readers will remember, we spent a good bit of time and space back during the Bush years showing parallels between American democracy then and European monarchy in the days of Henry VIII as well as King George III.

So what’s the lesson for today?

There is a great and telling line in the film that should help readers understand where we are today in American law.

Elizabeth Boleyn, the mother of Mary and Ann Boleyn, is arguing with her husband Thomas about sending Ann off to exile in the French court, while offering up Mary as a mistress to King Henry. She is trying to convince her husband that the family’s rise to wealth and power by courting the king will end badly, but he is too greedy to listen.

When Thomas downplays her assertion that the head of the previous resident of their new palace is now resting on the end of a stake, he counters by saying yes, but “he committed treason.”

“What is treason,” Elizabeth asks, “but whatever the king and his lawyers say it is?”

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by Glynn Wilson

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder was lobbied to drop the case against former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman during his trip to Birmingham Thursday for the swearing in of Joyce White Vance as U.S. attorney for the state’s northern district, sources say.

Several people, including Alabama Democratic Party officials, spoke to Holder on behalf of Siegelman, and about firing U.S. Attorney Leura Canary — the prosecutor married to Karl Rove’s political ally Bill Canary of the conservative Business Council of Alabama — according to sources present for the swearing in.

Barry Ragsdale, an attorney who is a friend of the Vances and has been associated with the Over the Mountain Democrats in the past, acted as master of ceremonies for the swearing in. Apparently he is a funny guy, and made several jokes, including poking fun at Chief U.S. District Judge Mark E. Fuller of Alabama’s middle district, the federal judge who presided in the controversial case against Siegelman and his co-defendant Richard Scrushy.

“I’m glad Karl Rove gave you permission to be here,” Ragsdale quipped, according to the Birmingham News account of the swearing in.

Rove, of course, was the chief political adviser to President George W. Bush, who recently testified in an investigation of the U.S. House Judiciary Committee on political prosecutions and political firings of U.S. attorneys.

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Guest Column
by Rep. John Conyers

In the Wall Street Journal, Karl Rove says that I — and others — owe him an apology for allegations that have been made about him during the course of the House Judiciary Committee’s investigation into the dismissal of United States Attorneys and related issues about the politicization of the Department of Justice.

Mr. Rove’s self-serving assertions on this subject are simply inconsistent with the documents that the Judiciary Committee recently released and his claims have been discredited by the analysis of the documents and reporting on these matters by credible news outlets across the country. Anyone interested in the truth can read the documents for themselves (here) or the reporting on these matters from the top papers in the U.S. — The Washington Post (here) and The New York Times (here) — as well as alternative, independent news sites such as The Locust Fork News-Journal (here).

Mr. Rove’s points are largely a repeat of his prior discredited statements, and the purpose of this post is not to rehash Mr. Rove’s rehash.

What may be of broader interest is the apparent editorial decision of the Wall Street Journal to prominently feature Mr. Rove’s self-serving assertions in its editorial pages, while burying and redacting the original story documenting the facts contained in these documents in the news pages.

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by Glynn Wilson

Karl Rove admits having a “senior moment” in his testimony to the House Judiciary Committee, dancing around the key allegations that he had direct knowledge and an active role in the prosecution of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman and the firings of U.S. attorneys. He takes what Washington insiders call the Ronald Reagan defense, a.k.a. the “Alzheimer’s defense,” as in “I don’t recall.”

In other words, and in contradiction with other published reports that Rove once again denied his role in manipulating the justice system from the White House, Rove’s testimony is what we call in the news business, “a non-denial denial.”

In transcripts and documents released Tuesday by the committee, Rove freely admits his friendship with former Alabama Attorney General William “Bill” Pryor, who started the first investigation of Siegelman in 1998.

Rove admits the role he and his campaign operation played in turning Alabama’s Supreme Court Republican. He admits knowing Bill Canary of the Business Council all the way back to the days when he worked for George Herbert Walker Bush, and to communicating with Canary “maybe a dozen times” while Rove was the top political adviser to President George W. Bush in the White House

Under questioning from Elliot Mincberg, majority chief counsel for investigations and oversight, Rove admits meeting Bill Canary’s wife Leura Canary, the federal prosecutor who first brought the second case against Siegelman in Montgomery.

“I’m pretty sure I’ve met her, but I don’t have any great familiarity,” Rove testifies. Then later, when asked how he communicated with her, “in person or on the phone,” he says, “I’m sure I had contact with her, but I literally couldn’t tell you if I have ever talked to her or if I have ever seen her in person. I believe I met her at something in Alabama, but — I am sure Bill has introduced me to her, but I don’t know. It may have been to the White House holiday party or something. But I don’t recall.”

Right.

Rove admits he most likely advocated for her to get the nod as U.S. attorney initially, “If she passed the process with Justice.”

When asked if the issue of political corruption in Alabama ever came up during her confirmation process, Rove answered: “Not that I recall.” When asked if the issue of Governor Siegelman ever came up in his conversations with her, he testified: “Not that I recall.”

According to legal analyst Scott Horton, a contributor to Harper’s magazine and a lecturer at Columbia, “the documents collectively make it clear that Karl Rove was not only at the center of the dismissal of the U.S. attorneys, but also exercised close oversight over other matters at the Justice Department. The case in New Mexico seems clearly to be one where the dismissal of a U.S. attorney occurred in order to corruptly influence a criminal investigation.”

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The U.S. House Judiciary Committee has released thousands of pages of new documents today in its investigation of White House political manipulation of justice, including never before seen White House e-mail messages and the transcripts of two depositions with former Bush political aide Karl Rove.

We are going through the documents now and will have a full report later on, but for now, you can download and evaluate the documents at this link on the House Judiciary Committee Website.

At a glance, the documents seem to indicate Rove was involved in a conspiracy to manipulate hiring and firing at the Department of Justice.

Rep. John Conyers, chairman of the House Judiciary committee, says the newly released transcripts show that former Bush senior adviser Karl Rove was the “driving force” behind several of the firings of U.S. attorneys.

“After all the delay and despite all the obfuscation, lies, and spin, this basic truth can no longer be denied: Karl Rove and his cohorts at the Bush White House were the driving force behind several of these firings, which were done for improper reasons,” Conyers said in a statement.

The 6,000-plus documents show that Rove “played a critical role in the firing of the U.S. attorney in New Mexico following the 2006 elections.”

Controversies or Conflicts of Interest?

by Glynn Wilson

White House counsel Greg Craig may soon step down from his post, sources say.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting he may resign due to a “rocky tenure” for his handling of certain national-security issues that have now become “political liabilities,” including the rocky discussions over the closing of the Gitmo prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the controversies over whether to release Bush-era national security documents and how to handle the detainees held there.

Washington attorney Greg Craig

The administration is still considering closing the controversial prison and bringing some of the alleged terrorists to be housed and tried in the U.S., according to the AP.

But is it possible that the conflicts of interest are finally getting the best of Craig, the consummate Ivy League Washington insider who is an old friend of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman and who has also represented the Bushes and Karl Rove in the past?

We broke the story about Craig’s conflicts of interest back in March under the headline:

White House Counsel Greg Craig Asked to ‘Step Down’

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that, according the paper’s sources, “the final decision hasn’t been made” on whether Craig will step down or not. Perhaps it depends on whether this article grows legs or not, and whether the activist public picks up on it and demands once again that he resign.

According to Alabama attorney and whistle-blower Jill Simpson, who first demanded that Craig resign in a letter from her Montgomery attorney Priscilla Duncan, the question of whether Craig should resign should rest on whether he “is doing a good job for the Democrats.”

“I think the answer would be no,” Ms. Simpson said. “President Obama was elected by Democrats and independents in this country who sought change in the direction our country was headed. However, Mr. Craig as legal counsel to the president has provided us with no change.”

She pointed out that we still have a Department of Justice that is “riddled with problems,” detention centers both here and abroad “filled with folks who don’t need to be there,” and a White House legal counsel’s office filed with attorneys who “just don’t get it.”

“The voters were seeking a country that respects the rule of law and wants it upheld by thier government officials,” she said. “In fact, it may be the very actions of Greg Craig that cause the Democrats to lose many seats in the 2010 elections because he just does not get it or is bought out by the establishment.”

Through his law firm, Williams and Connolly, Craig has ties to Republicans going all the way back to Watergate. He has represented George Bush Sr., George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, Donald Rumsfeld and former CIA director George Tenet.

“It is time for the Democrats to demand an office of legal counsel ran by Democrats,” Ms. Simpson said. “That is the only way we are ever going to see change in America.”

New York Times and Washington Post Pawns in Leaks

Alabama Whistle-Blower Says Rove Should Be Charged

President George Bush comforts Karl Rove on the day he was forced to resign from the White House in August, 2007.

by Glynn Wilson

The master of spin from the Bush years, Karl Rove, is at it again, even as he testified before the House Judiciary Committee for the second time Thursday about his role in manipulating America’s judicial system from his office in the West Wing of the White House.

While the transcript of Rove’s testimony might be released in August and the committee may hold a public hearing on White House involvement in the political firing of U.S. attorneys and other executive branch intrusions into the judicial branch, including the prosecution of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, Rove had already granted interviews with the New York Times and Washington Post to spin the story his way in what may constitute an act of obstruction of justice. Rove even selectively released a few e-mail messages to the papers to bolster his case, although what was reported seems to indicate he was just as involved as we have been reporting for the past two years.

Here’s how the Washington Post played the story.

Political adviser Karl Rove and other high-ranking figures in the Bush White House played a greater role than previously understood in the firing of federal prosecutors almost three years ago, according to e-mails obtained by The Washington Post, in a scandal that led to mass Justice Department resignations and an ongoing criminal probe.

Rove Had Heavier Hand in Prosecutor Firings Than Previously Known

In the exclusive interviews Rove granted to the Post and the Times earlier this month, Rove described himself as a “conduit” of grievances from lawmakers and others about the performance of certain prosecutors.

“The e-mails and interview were provided on the condition that they not be released until Rove’s House testimony concluded,” according to the Post.

Rove said he did not recall several events because of his “busy job” and asserted that he had done nothing to influence criminal cases, “an allegation by Democrats that has dogged him for years,” the Post reports, even though the Post has not been the lead news organization investigating Rove.

The Post allows itself to be used by Rove and his attorney Robert Luskin, who asserts that “there was never any point where Karl was trying to get a particular prosecution advanced or retarded.”

“Yes, I was a recipient of complaints, and I passed them on to the counsel’s office to be passed onto Justice,” Rove told the papers in what appears to be a total distortion of what actually happened. This will most likely come out in the end in either the congressional probe or an ongoing criminal case.

Rove injects a canard about “weak enforcement of voter fraud laws and public corruption,” which he says “had the sound of authenticity to me. If what I’m told is accurate, it’s really troublesome.”

What the two top newspapers in the land don’t seem to realize is that this is an attempt by Rove to not only snake his way out of culpability in politicizing the Justice Department, but to actually try and make it appear as if he gives a damn about the problems he created as Bush’s lead political brain and attack dog. Every single decision made by the Bush administration was filtered through Rove to make sure it met political muster, and the administration aggressively pursued a strategy of taking over the country by the Republican Party. Rove often promised his GOP buddies that his mission was to keep the Republicans in charge of the country “for a generation.”

So why does this come as a surprise to the Post and the Times at this late date?

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Glynn Wilson

Former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman in front of the federal courthouse in Montgomery, with Sephira Bailey Shuttlesworth, wife of Birmingham Civil Rights icon Fred Shuttlesworth, in the background.

Federal prosecutors in Montgomery filed their response this week to Alabama Governor Don Siegelman’s and HealthSouth founder Richard Scrushy’s motion for a new trial, and their demands for recusal of Chief U.S. District Justice Mark E. Fuller.

It is boilerplate legalese that basically says they do not deserve a new trial and the judge should not recuse himself.

Siegelman reacted immediately to the news.

“I am shocked by the contentions of the United States Government’s response to the motion for the judge to recuse himself from all other proceedings in this case,” Siegelman said in an e-mail message.

“The government farcically argues that the trial judge and 11th Circuit decided in my case that the system operated fairly for me because the trial judge assumed that the emails from Juror No. 7 and Juror No. 40 were ‘authentic’.” he said. “So when he denied our motion for a new trial, based on those emails, both courts said that it’s OK for jurors to be emailing each other before the close of the government’s case, OK to be in a a conspiracy to subvert the defendant’s constitutional right to a fair trial.”

Keep in mind what these jurors were saying and what they were trying to do, he said.

For background, check this story from our archives:
Explosive New Story Lends Credence to Siegelman Appeal

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An Update From DC

House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers told a nationwide audience via C-SPAN at the National Press Club today (July 24) that Attorney Gen. Eric Holder “must appoint a special counsel” to investigate DoJ abuses under the Bush Administration.

Also, he urged formation of a “blue-ribbon” panel to explore abuses by DoJ. Conyers said that more scrutiny is needed beyond the Judiciary Committee’s oversight hearings in recent years, especially because many witnesses have declined to appear.

During a reception before his remarks, Conyers told me that he was not aware of two recent allegations of DoJ abuses, including the alleged “blackmail” of Siegelman/Scrushy prosecution witness Nick Bailey by DoJ reported this week and DoJ’s firing of whistleblower Tamarah Grimes.

See, for example, Did DoJ Blackmail Siegelman Witness With Sex Scandal? and Prosecutors Used ‘Sex Scandal’ to Intimidate Key Witness in Siegelman Case.

Conyers encouraged me to provide the stories to his staff for his review. I’ll be doing so, with copies to traditional newspaper and broadcast channels that have largely ignored the latest developments.

Andrew Kreig
Washington, D.C.