Too little, too late sums up CREW's reaction to the appointment of a special prosecutor to finally investigate the firings of U.S. Attorneys.  We first made that call on March 13, 2007. It took a new Attorney General and a long overdue report, compiled without subpoena authority, to get there. 

Here's our statement from Melanie Sloan:

Six more months have been wasted in getting to the truth behind the firings of the U.S. Attorneys. It should come as no surprise to anyone that the Inspector General and the Office of Professional Responsibility were not able to come to any firm conclusions given their lack of subpoena authority. After the top law enforcement officials in the nation lied with apparent impunity during congressional hearings, how could anyone reasonably expect that these officials would see the light, speak freely, and tell the truth now? CREW first called for the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate the firings back in March of 2007; it is gratifying to see that 18 months later, the Justice Department finally has recognized the matter merits criminal investigation. Why the delay? The only feasible explanation: to ensure the Bush administration is long over before anyone could ever be held responsible for one of the most shameful episodes in the administration’s history.

Major development in the on-going scandal surrounding the firings of the U.S. Attorneys:

Attorney General Michael Mukasey has appointed a special prosecutor to pursue possible criminal charges against Republicans involved in the controversial firings of U.S. attorneys.

The move is the top recommendation of a Justice Department investigation that harshly criticizes Bush administration officials, members of Congress and their aides.

Results of the investigation were made public Monday. The report singled out the removal of U.S. Attorney David Iglesias (ih-GLAY'-see-us) of New Mexico as the most troubling.

An editorial in today's New York Times challenges the Attorney General to prosecute the illegalities that occurred at the Department of Justice.  A report released yesterday by the department outlines the illegal actions taken by senior staffers.  If crimes were committed, punishment is warranted -- especially at the Department of Justice:

Mr. Mukasey’s response to the report focused on making sure that the improper and illegal activity “does not occur again.” He does not seem to understand that, as the nation’s top law enforcement officer, he has a duty to investigate crimes committed in his own department and to punish the offenders. The report’s authors could not interview Ms. Goodling because she no longer works at the Justice Department. Mr. Mukasey, who has subpoena power, presumably could get her to talk — as well as Mr. Rove, Ms. Miers and all of the others who need to testify under oath before this matter can be put to rest.

The strength of American democracy depends on our ability to be shocked by abuses like these — and to punish them appropriately.

The current Attorney General is running into some of the same problems the former Attorney General had.  And, those problems persist throughout the Bush administration.  Congress wants information. Nothing happens.  Rep. Waxman is raising the specter of contempt against Mukasey:

House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) on Tuesday threatened Attorney General Michael Mukasey with a contempt citation unless he provides the panel with documents related to the leak of the name of a CIA operative.

Waxman’s committee issued a subpoena last month requesting the reports of FBI interviews with President Bush and Vice President Cheney.

“You have neither complied with this subpoena by its returnable date nor asserted any privilege to justify withholding documents from the committee,” Waxman wrote in a letter to Mukasey. “In light of your actions, I am writing to inform you that the committee will meet on July 16, 2008, to consider a resolution citing you for contempt of Congress. I strongly urge you to comply with the duly issued subpoena before then.”

Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) wants the Attorney General to explain why the public corruption unit of the U.S. Attorneys Office in Los Angeles was shut down.  That's the office investigation Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-CA), who was named one of the most corrupt members of Congress in CREW's report, Beyond DeLay.

According to The Hill, Feinstein is demanding an explanation:

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) on Wednesday called on Attorney General Michael Mukasey to explain the decision to eliminate the public corruption unit in Los Angeles that has been investigating Rep. Jerry Lewis's (R-Calif.) ties to a lobbying firm.

The U.S. Attorney for the central district of California in Los Angeles reassigned the 17 lawyers in the public corruption unit and disbanded it earlier this month. The decision has stirred ill will and low morale within the office and raised questions about whether pending and future public corruption cases will be rigorously pursued, according to press accounts.

Attorneys in the Los Angeles office have spent years reviewing an FBI investigation into Lewis's connection to a lobbying firm and the earmarks its clients received. Lewis has doled out more than a million dollars in attorney fees related to the probe.

Yesterday, CREW sent a letter to Attorney General Michael Mukasey requesting the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate the millions of missing White House e-mails. The Associated Press picked up the story:

An advocacy group on Monday sought a criminal probe of the White House over millions of possibly missing e-mails, saying someone may have deliberately deleted them to conceal involvement in a potential crime.

In a letter to Attorney General Michael Mukasey, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington said the White House also may have violated two federal record-keeping laws, including the Federal Records Act, which carries criminal sanctions for unlawful destruction.

CREW, which is suing the Executive Office of the President, said over 10 million e-mails from March 2003 to October 2005 are missing. The period coincides with the runup to the Iraq invasion and the leaking by at least three top White House aides of the CIA identity of Valerie Plame.

The White House referred questions on the letter to the Justice Department, which declined immediate comment.

Today, CREW sent a letter to Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey asking that he appoint a special counsel to investigate the disappearance of millions of White House emails.  The letter and our accompanying exhibits can be found here. 

Specifically, CREW asked for an investigation into whether the White House violated federal record-keeping laws by knowingly failing to preserve and restore millions of emails and by deliberately failing to use an effective and appropriate record-keeping system for the preservation of federal and presidential electronic records. The White House is subject to two sets of federal laws governing how it must maintain and preserve its records, the Federal Records Act (FRA) and the Presidential Records Act (PRA).

When we sent the letter to the Attorney General, Melanie Sloan made this statement:

The importance and historical significance of the missing emails makes it imperative that an impartial special counsel be appointed without delay to investigate the disappearance of these records.  The missing emails do not belong to the Bush administration, but to the American people. The Attorney General should take action to protect the right of future generations to look back and understand the role of White House officials in critical events.

On January 15th, in a court filing submitted in response to CREW v. Executive Office of the President, the White House admitted destroying back-up copies of some of its emails. Over 10 million emails are missing from between March 2003 and October 2005 and the White House stated that up until October of 2003, back-up tapes containing the only copies of some of the missing emails were recycled.

This means that there likely are no back-up copies of emails deleted during the period of March 2003 through October 2003, the time during which top White House officials leaked the covert identity of Valerie Plame Wilson and the Justice Department began a criminal investigation into the leak. The White House has offered no explanation as to why the emails were deleted, how many were actually lost and why it never acted to recover any of the missing emails, despite having been presented with a recovery plan by its own Office of Administration.

After filing this court document, the White House deputy press secretary Tony Fratto denied that there were, in fact, any missing emails. As a result, House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Henry A. Waxman (D-CA), released a letter stating that the White House had informed committee staff that there were 473 days for which no emails were stored for one or more of the White House offices.

Given that White House officials may have deliberately deleted emails to cover up involvement in a potential crime, the need for a criminal investigation is clear.   But it is equally apparent that the Department of Justice does not have the requisite independence to conduct such a probe.

As a result, CREW is requesting that the Attorney General appoint a special counsel.  It is imperative.

The successor to Alberto Gonzales as Attorney General moved one step closer to obtaining that job when the Senate Judiciary Committee voted in favor of his nomination:

Judge Michael Mukasey on Tuesday cleared the biggest hurdle that stood between him and the post of attorney general when the Senate Judiciary Committee approved his nomination 11-8.

Sens. Dianne Feinstein (Calif.) and Charles Schumer (N.Y.) were the only Democrats who voted to support Mukasey. The nomination is now headed to the Senate floor, where Mukasey is expected to pass easily.

The Senate Judiciary Committee has been holding a hearing today on the nomination of Michael Mukasey as Attorney General. TPMmuckraker has been live-blogging the event and providing video. As you can imagine, many of the concerns CREW has about ethics have been raised. Check out this interaction about executive privilege: