Think Progress

Pataki uses 9/11 to claim Obama’s policy ‘jeopardizes our ability to continue to effectively protect our country.’

Recently, the Guardian interviewed former New York governor George Pataki to discuss the eighth anniversary of 9/11. Pataki, who was in Manhattan when the World Trade Center was hit, used the opportunity to criticize the decision by Attorney General Eric Holder to investigate CIA interrogators who went beyond their legal guidance, saying it “jeopardizes” national security:

“Placing CIA officials who were acting in the aftermath of the worst attacks against our country and civilians in our history in possible criminal jeopardy years after the fact is in my mind a horrible decision.

“It jeopardizes our ability to continue to effectively protect our country against those who hate us and want to attack us again.”

Oddly, Pataki claimed that his disapproval of the investigation sprung from a concern for the rule of law. “We must make sure we obey the rule of law and act in ways that are not just legal but moral,” said Pataki. “But now, years after the fact, to consider charges is wrong for our country, wrong for our security and wrong for the entire world that believes in the rule of law.”

Gonzales backs Holder’s torture investigation.

In an interview with the Washington Times today, former attorney general Alberto Gonzales defended Eric Holder’s decision to investigate CIA interrogation abuses, despite claims by Vice President Cheney that it is an “outrageous political act.” “As chief prosecutor of the United States, he should make the decision on his own, based on the facts, then inform the White House,” said Gonzales, whose tenure was marked by intense political meddling on the part of White House officials. More from the interview:

We worked very hard to establish ground rules and parameters about how to deal with terrorists. And if people go beyond that, I think it is legitimate to question and examine that conduct to ensure people are held accountable for their actions, even if it’s action in prosecuting the war on terror.

Listen here:

Of course, Gonzales said he was reassured that Holder was interested the “one percent of actors” who went beyond the legal authorization and not the 99 percent who “are heroes and and should be treated like heroes for the most part.” No doubt that Gonzales puts himself in that 99-percent group.

Kerry: Holder is ‘not pursuing a political agenda’; he’s ‘doing what he believes the law requires him to do.’

Today on Fox News Sunday, Vice President Cheney attacked Attorney General Eric Holder for opening a “preliminary investigation into whether some CIA operatives broke the law in their coercive interrogations of suspected terrorists.” Cheney called it an “outrageous political act,” “intensely partisan,” and “politicized.” But on ABC’s This Week, Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) pointed out that President Obama has been a bit more reluctant to open an investigation. Holder’s decision to nevertheless move forward is actually a welcome break from the days of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who made all his decisions based on political guidance from the White House:

KERRY: I think there is a little bit of a tension between the White House itself and the lawyers in the Justice Department as they see the law and as what their obligation is. In a sense, that’s good. That’s appropriate, because it shows that we have an attorney general who is not pursuing a political agenda, but who is doing what he believes the law requires him to do. And we have an administration, on the other hand, that is balancing some of those other issues.

Watch it:

The only reason Cheney thinks the investigation is partisan is because he disagrees with it. Holder is doing what an attorney general is supposed to do — following the law, not political considerations.

Holder ‘leaning toward appointing a prosecutor to investigate’ Bush admin’s torture policies.

In April, President Obama revised his position on whether to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the Bush administration’s use of torture. After initially stating “that we need to look forward as opposed to looking backwards,” Obama said “that is going to be more of a decision for the Attorney General within the parameters of various laws, and I don’t want to prejudge that.” Yesterday, Newsweek’s Daniel Klaidman reported that Attorney General Eric Holder “is now leaning toward appointing a prosecutor to investigate the Bush administration’s brutal interrogation practices”:

These are not just the philosophical musings of a new attorney general. Holder, 58, may be on the verge of asserting his independence in a profound way. Four knowledgeable sources tell NEWSWEEK that he is now leaning toward appointing a prosecutor to investigate the Bush administration’s brutal interrogation practices, something the president has been reluctant to do. While no final decision has been made, an announcement could come in a matter of weeks, say these sources, who decline to be identified discussing a sensitive law-enforcement matter. Such a decision would roil the country, would likely plunge Washington into a new round of partisan warfare, and could even imperil Obama’s domestic priorities, including health care and energy reform. Holder knows all this, and he has been wrestling with the question for months. “I hope that whatever decision I make would not have a negative impact on the president’s agenda,” he says. “But that can’t be a part of my decision.”

The AP’s Nedra Pickler confirms that Holder is considering appointing a special prosecutor and that he “will make a final decision within the next few weeks.”

Attorney General Holder reminds Sessions who’s boss.

This morning, Attorney General Eric Holder testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Ranking member Jeff Sessions (R-AL) slammed the Justice Department’s release of Bush-era memos authorizing the use of torture on terrorist suspects, telling Holder that his “predecessor, Judge Mukasey, and Mr. Hayden,” the former Director of National Intelligence, “didn’t approve of that at all.” Holder reminded Sessions that Mukasey and Hayden were no longer in charge:

SESSIONS: Well it was disapproved by your predecessor, Judge Mukasey, and Mr. Hayden, the CIA, um, DIA [sic] director. They didn’t approve of that at all. … You were willing to release matters that the DNI and the Attorney General believe were damaging to our national security.

HOLDER: Well, one attorney general thought that. I am the Attorney General of the United States, and it is this attorney general’s view that the release of that information was appropriate, as well as the president of the United States. I respect their opinion, but I had to make the decision, holding the office that I now hold.

Watch it:

Obama announces release of Bush-era OLC torture memos.

President Obama announced this afternoon in a written statement that the Justice Department is releasing memos from the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) between 2002 and 2005 which “speak to techniques that were used in the interrogation of terrorism suspects.” In his statement, Obama laid out his reasoning for making the memos public and announced that his administration would not seek to prosecute individuals who “who carried out their duties relying in good faith upon legal advice from the Department of Justice”:

First, the interrogation techniques described in these memos have already been widely reported. Second, the previous Administration publicly acknowledged portions of the program – and some of the practices – associated with these memos. Third, I have already ended the techniques described in the memos through an Executive Order. Therefore, withholding these memos would only serve to deny facts that have been in the public domain for some time. This could contribute to an inaccurate accounting of the past, and fuel erroneous and inflammatory assumptions about actions taken by the United States.

In releasing these memos, it is our intention to assure those who carried out their duties relying in good faith upon legal advice from the Department of Justice that they will not be subject to prosecution. The men and women of our intelligence community serve courageously on the front lines of a dangerous world.

Attorney General Eric Holder issued a parallel statement in which he not only promised not to pursue prosecutions but also to provide representation “in any state or federal judicial or administrative proceeding brought against” any CIA employee who acted “reasonably” upon the advice of the OLC. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Pat Leahy (D-VT) responded to the release by reiterating his desire to hold a “Commission of Inquiry” into the Bush administration’s use of torture in order to gain a “thorough accounting of what happened.” Read the memos here.

Holder: Cheney is ‘way off the mark’ to say Obama has made the U.S. less safe.

Last month, Vice President Cheney claimed that President Obama is “making some choices that…raise the risk to the American people of another attack,” referring to Obama’s decisions to close Guantanamo and end torture. Yesterday, Attorney General Eric Holder responded to Cheney, telling CBS’s Katie Couric that Cheney’s comments were “totally false”:

HOLDER: Well, I think that’s totally false. It’s inconsistent with the facts. … All the things that we’re doing are designed to enhance the safety of the American people. And closing Guantanamo is, in fact, one of those things. It takes away from people who are our enemies. A recruiting tool. It actually makes our relationships with our allies a lot less complicated. If you look at what the president is doing, what this administration is doing in Afghanistan, what we’re doing with regard to Guantanamo, I think the former vice president’s remarks are are way off the mark.

Watch it:

Vice President Biden also said this week that Cheney is “dead wrong,” noting that the “last administration left us in a weaker posture than we’ve been any time since World War II.” Senior Obama adviser David Axelrod said on Sunday that Cheney has not been acting like a “statesman.”

Holder: America is a ‘nation of cowards’ on racial matters.

Today, Attorney General Eric Holder spoke at the Justice Department in honor of Black History Month. As the first African-American leading the DOJ, he called for a national dialogue on race — something the United States has generally avoided:

Though this nation has proudly thought of itself as an ethnic melting pot, in things racial, we have always been, and we, I believe, continue to be, in two many ways, a nation of cowards. Though race related issues continue to occupy a significant portion of our political discussion, and though there remain many unresolved racial issue in this nation, we, average Americans, simply do not talk enough with each other about things racial. [...]

And we, in this room, bear a special responsibility. Through its work and through its example, the Department of Justice — this Department of Justice — as long as I’m here, must and will leave the nation to the new birth of freedom so long ago promised by our greatest president. This is our duty, this is our solemn responsibility.

Holder’s remarks are a refreshing break from the Bush administration, during which Justice Department officials allowed conservative political interests to trump civil rights concerns. Watch Holder’s speech here.

Obama’s nominees stuck in the Senate.

The Washington Post’s Al Kamen notes that while President Obama has nominated his top appointees at a record pace, the Senate has been approving them at a slower rate than they did for his predecessors:

But less than two weeks into his presidency, just 17 of the 31 nominees officially announced by the White House have been confirmed by the Senate. [...] By comparison, 19 of Bill Clinton’s nominees were confirmed in his first 10 days in office. George W. Bush, who had a much abbreviated transition because of the Florida recount, had 13 nominees confirmed in the first 10 days, according to an analysis by the Presidential Transition Project at New York University’s Wagner School of Public Service in cooperation with The Washington Post.

Among the key nominees awaiting confirmation are Eric Holder for attorney general and Rep. Hilda Solis (D-CA) for Labor Secretary. For example, Senate Republicans have obstructed Holder’s confirmation for 63 days since Obama nominated him on Dec. 1.

- Matt Finkelstein

Senate Judiciary Committee recommends Holder.

In a 17-2 vote today, the Senate Judiciary Committee recommended President Obama’s attorney general nominee Eric Holder to the full Senate for consideration. Six Republicans approved Holder, with Tom Coburn (R-OK) and John Cornyn (R-TX) as the only “nay” votes. Yesterday, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) announced that he would support Holder’s nomination, even though he had expressed reservations about the pick and forced Senate Democrats to delay the hearings.

Cornyn delays Holder’s confirmation to make sure Bush administration isn’t prosecuted for torture.

In his confirmation hearing, Attorney General nominee Eric Holder unequivocally declared that “waterboarding is torture” and has signaled a willingness to investigate Bush officials. But torture advocate Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) is holding up the nomination because he wants to know exactly whether Holder will pursue criminal prosecutions of “intelligence personnel” involved in torture.

“It could well be there will be a request to delay the markup for a week so those questions can be asked and answered,” Cornyn said. “Part of my concern relates to his statements at the hearing with regard to torture and what his intentions are toward our intelligence personnel who were operating in good faith based on their understanding of what the law was.”

Holder breaks with Mukasey, says ‘waterboarding is torture.’

In October 2007, during his confirmation hearings, Attorney General Michael Mukasey refused to call waterboarding torture and to this day has not called it torture. In his confirmation hearing today, Attorney General nominee Eric Holder clearly said that he believes waterboarding is torture:

HOLDER: If you look at the history of the use of that technique, used by the Khmer Rouge, used in the Inquisition, used by the Japanese and prosecuted by us as war crimes. We prosecuted our own soldiers for using it in Vietnam. I agree with you, Mr. Chairman, waterboarding is torture.

In another break with Bush administration officials, Holder said other countries would be violating international law if they waterboarded U.S. citizens. Watch it:

Holder also said that the President cannot immunize officials who committed acts of torture. “No one is above the law,” he stated.