Even John Ashcroft’s Justice Department couldn’t get around the obvious decision with this one.
As you no doubt recall, GOP staffers on the Senate Judiciary Committee stole thousands of documents from the committee’s Dems that showed how Dems worked to block a handful of Bush judicial nominees. Last month, the Senate’s Sergeant-at-Arms William Pickle concluded a three-month investigation with a report pointing to months of GOP thefts and subsequent leaks to conservatives in the media.
Pickle also cited several federal laws that could (should) face criminal prosecutions. Apparently, the Justice Department agreed.
The Justice Department tapped a U.S. attorney from New York yesterday to investigate whether laws were violated when two Senate Republican aides accessed Democratic computer files on strategy for blocking President Bush’s judicial nominations.
The probe will be conducted by David Kelley, the acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York — a choice that appeared to satisfy Democrats, who had pushed for a tough prosecutor who would conduct an aggressive probe free of influence from Washington.
This is a positive and encouraging development. Hopefully, the responsible parties will be held accountable, but more importantly, we’ll get some additional information about whether the White House was involved at all with the crime.
The Sergeant-at-Arms inquiry was strictly limited and lacked subpoena power. Pickle had no way of digging any deeper; Kelley won’t face those limits.
Let’s not forget, in early March, Sen. Pat Leahy (D-Vt.), one of the senators whose files were accessed illegally, asked White House counsel Alberto Gonzales if his office had received any of the stolen files. Gonzales cagily avoided answering the question.
In response [to Leahy], Mr. Gonzales offered a denial that was less than categorical, saying: “I am not aware of any credible allegation of White House involvement in this matter. Consequently, there has been no White House investigation or effort to determine whether anyone at the White House was aware of or involved in these activities.”
I look forward to Kelley getting to the bottom of all this.