Apparently, it's protocol for the President of the United States to speak warmly of a United States Senator who has been indicted on seven counts by said President's Department of Justice. Don't think a case of this importance wasn't vetted by the top appointees at DOJ:

Last week, President Bush's Justice Department announced that Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska had been indicted on federal corruption charges. Yesterday, the two men came together at a military base in Stevens's state, where Bush warmly praised the Senate's longest-serving Republican.

"The United States military has had no better supporter and stronger friend than Senator Ted Stevens. Thank you for coming, Senator," Bush said, addressing a crowd of military personnel and their families at Eielson Air Force Base as Air Force One refueled en route to Asia.

The president made no mention of the criminal charges alleging that Stevens made false statements about pricey renovations to his home near Anchorage. The two men did not talk to each other at the base, although Stevens, who has pleaded not guilty to all counts, was seen chatting with White House Chief of Staff Joshua B. Bolten.

White House officials said Stevens was invited as a matter of protocol. Press secretary Dana Perino told reporters that Stevens's attendance was "absolutely appropriate."

Just because DeLay isn't asking for a pardon, doesn't mean that a pardon for DeLay won't be discussed.  According to The Hill, sometimes pardons are given without a request:

Tom DeLay’s legal advisers are ruling out seeking a presidential pardon for the embattled former House majority leader.

DeLay (R-Texas), who declined to comment for this article, resigned from Congress more than two years ago after being indicted, and remains embroiled in legal proceedings in Texas and Washington.

With Bush’s second term winding down, DeLay is the most prominent politician and Bush ally who could benefit from presidential clemency.

But Richard Cullen, who is representing DeLay in the federal investigation against him, said there should be no question of a pardon.

“I would rule it out,” he said. “No one has suggested that Mr. DeLay is guilty of a crime. He has stated clearly that he has not committed a crime.”

Okay.  But this is critical:

Legal experts say a person does not need to request a pardon to receive one from the president.

Margaret Colgate Love, the U.S. pardon attorney from 1990 to 1997, said: “Historically, most people who have been pardoned have asked to be pardoned, but there have been exceptions.”

Love said President Clinton commuted the sentences of Puerto Rican nationalists without receiving requests.

“I understand there were a number of people who were the beneficiaries of final grants who didn’t ask.”

 

Today, CREW sent a letter to the Department of Justice asking for an investigation into whether lobbyist Stephen Payne violated any criminal laws by offering to arrange meetings with top administration officials in return for a contribution to the Bush library and a substantial commission for serving as a go-between, and whether any administration officials broke the law by participating in a scheme to sell meetings for contributions.  The letter to DOJ can be found here.

The Times of London has reported that a Times investigator asked Mr. Payne to arrange meetings in Washington for an exiled former central Asian president. Mr. Payne can be seen on videotape saying that such meetings can be arranged for “somewhere between $600,000 and $750,000, with about a third of it going directly to the Bush library.” The balance would go to Mr. Payne’s lobbying firm, Worldwide Strategic Partners. When asked which officials might be available to meet for that price, Mr. Payne replied, “Cheney’s possible, definitely the national security adviser [Stephen Hadley], definitely either Dr. Rice or . . . I think a meeting with Dr. Rice or the deputy secretary [John Negroponte] is possible . . .”

Mr. Payne is a top Bush donor who raised more than $100,000 for the 2000 presidential election and another $200,000 for the president’s 2004 re-election campaign. He is also a member of the U.S. Homeland Security Advisory Council and has accompanied President Bush and Vice President Cheney on foreign trips.

Federal law prohibits public officials from directly or indirectly demanding, seeking, receiving, accepting, or agreeing to receive or accept anything of value in return for being influenced in the performance of an official act. If Mr. Payne was authorized by any member of the Bush administration to trade meetings with top level officials in return for financial contributions to the Bush library, those officials may have violated the bribery statute. Similarly, by offering to serve as a conduit to deliver contributions to the Bush library in exchange for meetings with administration officials, Mr. Payne may have violated federal law.

Melanie Sloan, executive director of CREW, said today:

It is clear from this week’s reporting that Mr. Payne is attempting to capitalize on his relationship with the President of the United States in a way that suggests United States foreign policy may be for sale to the highest bidder. Although the White House has denied any connection between official administration action and contributions to the library, considering Mr. Payne’s close ties to the White House, this simply is not credible. The Justice Department should immediately investigate if this administration is complicit in this or other contribution-for-meeting schemes with Mr. Payne.

CREW has been trying to obtain the records documenting Jack Abramoff's visits to the White House for months.

A new report from a House Committee found that George Bush had more dealings with Jack Abramoff than previously disclosed:

The White House had stronger ties to disgraced superlobbyist Jack Abramoff than it has publicly admitted, according to a draft congressional report released Monday.

President Bush met Abramoff on at least four occasions the White House has yet to acknowledge, according to the draft report by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

And White House officials appeared as comfortable going to Abramoff and his lobbyists seeking tickets to sporting and entertainment events, as they did seeking input on personnel picks for plum jobs, the report found.

President Bush himself met Abramoff on at least six occasions, the report said, citing White House documents; the White House had previously acknowledged only two.

When questions were first raised about Abramoff's connection to Bush officials in January 2006, then-White House spokesman Scott McClellan said Bush had personally met Abramoff on just two occasions, both at White House Hanukkah receptions.

We know they've met. Just not how many times, although that's becoming clearer:

Nearly three months ago the Secret Service, through its Department of Justice lawyers, told the court in two pending cases that it had “recently discovered information” relevant to CREW’s Freedom of Information Act request for records of visits by Jack Abramoff to the White House that it intended to file with the court.

Just yesterday CREW learned from another source that additional Secret Service records of at least two meetings President Bush had with Jack Abramoff have yet to be produced. So just where are these promised Secret Service records -- records, by the way, that would contradict the White House’s repeated claims that but for large social gatherings, President Bush never met with Mr. Abramoff? When pressed for an answer, a Department of Justice lawyer refused to say anything, apparently forgetting the very representations he had made months earlier to the court.

Last night, CREW filed a motion to compel the Secret Service to come forward with these long overdue missing records. Stay tuned for exactly what arguments the Secret Service offers in response, including the convenient defense, manufactured in another case CREW has against the Secret Service, that White House visitor records are no longer Secret Service agency records, but belong exclusively to the White House and are therefore beyond public reach.

And, lest we forget, Bush and Abramoff have met:

Judge Reggie Walton, who was appointed to the federal bench by George W. Bush in 2001, revealed his thoughts on Bush's commutation of Libby's sentence in a footnote to a legal document.  Walton, like so many of us, is "perplexed" by Bush's words and action:   

In an unusual expression of frustration, the judge who sentenced former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby to 30 months in jail, only to see the sentence commuted by President Bush, said he was "perplexed" by the act of clemency.

In his first public comments on the matter, U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton took issue with Bush's statement that the prison sentence ordered for Libby last month was "excessive." Walton defended the sentence, saying that he followed established legal precedents as well as a strict interpretation of federal sentencing guidelines that has been supported by Bush's own administration.

"In light of these considerations … it is fair to say that the court is somewhat perplexed as to how its sentence could accurately be characterized as 'excessive,' " Walton wrote.

"Although it is certainly the president's prerogative to justify the exercise of his constitutional commutation power in whatever manner he chooses, the court notes that the term of incarceration imposed in this case was determined after a careful consideration of each of the requisite statutory factors."

The judge, who was appointed to the federal bench by Bush in 2001 in part because of his tough law-and-order approach to sentencing, made the comments in a lengthy footnote to an order issued Thursday.

Hat tip Think Progress. 

Former White House Counsel Harriet Miers heeded the directive from President Bush today, Paul Kiel at TPM Muckraker reports:

Harriet Miers, as expected, defied a Congressional subpoena and did not show for her hearing before the House Judiciary Committee this morning.

In response, subcommittee chairwoman Linda Sanchez (D-CA) ruled that the White House's claim of executive privilege was invalid.

Harriet Miers was expected to testify tomorrow before the House Judiciary Committee about the U.S. Attorneys scandal.  Today, her former boss, George Bush, told Miers not to appear: 

President Bush ordered his former White House counsel, Harriet Miers, to defy a congressional subpoena and refuse to testify Thursday before a House panel investigating U.S. attorney firings.

"Ms. Miers has absolute immunity from compelled congressional testimony as to matters occurring while she was a senior adviser to the president," White House Counsel Fred Fielding wrote in a letter to Miers' lawyer, George T. Manning.

The Bush team is playing out the clock.  They're forcing the battle with Congress over the U.S. Attorneys scandal into the courts -- and that means this issue will continue after January 20, 2009 when Bush leaves office.  Melanie Sloan explained as much to the NY Daily News -- and "senior Bush adviser" agreed with her (that hasn't happened very often):

Now the fight over whether Gonzales sacked nine federal prosecutors for not carrying out White House political objectives will probably be settled in court.

That likely means the clock will run out and Team Bush will win by default, experts said.

"This most likely will not be resolved during this administration," admitted Melanie Sloan, director of the liberal legal watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, which asked for a special prosecutor to investigate.

A senior Bush adviser agreed, saying of Gonzales: "He's limping, but he's still there and it's over."

One of George Bush's justifications for commuting Scooter Libby's sentence was the Libby would still have to pay the $250,000 fine -- and serve his probation.  Libby did pay the fine today, but, the Federal District Court Judge has questioned whether the probation can still be applied.  Bush's commutation order may have absolved Libby of that punishment: 

Former White House aide Lewis Libby has paid a $250,000 fine as part of his sentence in the CIA leak case, but the probation he was scheduled to serve under the commutation of his prison sentence may not be served after all.

According to a July 3 order issued by Judge Reggie Walton, who was the trial judge in Libby's case: "Strictly construed, the statute authorizing the imposition of supervised release indicates that such release should only occur after the defendant has already served a term of imprisonment.

"President George W. Bush commuted the 30-month prison term that Libby was scheduled to serve before he served a day of it.

White House spokesman Scott Stanzel said that under Walton's June 22 sentencing order, Libby was required to report to the probation office within 72 hours of the release from custody to serve his period of supervision by the probation office.