The common thread among the fired U.S. Attorneys is the fact that they resisted efforts to politicize their offices. GOP officials wanted them to “play ball,” they didn’t, so they were purged. Josh Marshall noted a couple of days ago that this raises another disconcerting question: how many of Bush’s federal prosecutors were willing to play ball? In other words, how many U.S. Attorneys’ offices were effectively politicized?
It’s a point [tag]Paul Krugman[/tag] takes up in his column today.
For those of us living in the Garden State, the growing scandal over the firing of federal prosecutors immediately brought to mind the subpoenas that Chris Christie, the former Bush “Pioneer” who is now the U.S. attorney for New Jersey, issued two months before the 2006 election — and the way news of the subpoenas was quickly leaked to local news media.
The subpoenas were issued in connection with allegations of corruption on the part of Senator Bob Menendez, a Democrat who seemed to be facing a close race at the time. Those allegations appeared, on their face, to be convoluted and unconvincing, and Mr. Menendez claimed that both the investigation and the leaks were politically motivated.
Mr. Christie’s actions might have been all aboveboard. But given what we’ve learned about the pressure placed on federal prosecutors to pursue dubious investigations of Democrats, Mr. Menendez’s claims of persecution now seem quite plausible.
In fact, it’s becoming clear that the politicization of the Justice Department was a key component of the Bush administration’s attempt to create a permanent Republican lock on power.
The irony is the existing facts of this scandal already point to serious misconduct — including possible crimes — but we’ve barely begun to consider what the Bush gang successfully got the other U.S. Attorneys to do.
Consider this Christie example. Who’s willing to give the White House and the U.S. Attorney’s office the benefit of the doubt? As Josh Marshall asked, “Given what we know now, does anyone think the Iglesias and McKay cases are the only ones” to have been pressured to bring charges against a Democrat?
The New Jersey GOP wanted to paint Menendez as corrupt. The local U.S. Attorney launches an investigation based on flimsy accusations, shortly before the election. The campaign ends, Menendez wins, and, wouldn’t you know it, all of a sudden the investigation effectively ends.
How convenient.
Indeed, Krugman goes on to note that “statistical evidence suggests that many other prosecutors decided to protect their jobs or further their careers by doing what the administration wanted them to do: harass Democrats while turning a blind eye to Republican malfeasance.”
Donald Shields and John Cragan, two professors of communication, have compiled a database of investigations and/or indictments of candidates and elected officials by U.S. attorneys since the Bush administration came to power. Of the 375 cases they identified, 10 involved independents, 67 involved Republicans, and 298 involved Democrats. The main source of this partisan tilt was a huge disparity in investigations of local politicians, in which Democrats were seven times as likely as Republicans to face Justice Department scrutiny.
How can this have been happening without a national uproar? The authors explain: “We believe that this tremendous disparity is politically motivated and it occurs because the local (non-statewide and non-Congressional) investigations occur under the radar of a diligent national press. Each instance is treated by a local beat reporter as an isolated case that is only of local interest.”
And let’s not forget that Karl Rove’s candidates have a history of benefiting from conveniently timed federal investigations. Last year Molly Ivins reminded her readers of a curious pattern during Mr. Rove’s time in Texas: “In election years, there always seemed to be an F.B.I. investigation of some sitting Democrat either announced or leaked to the press. After the election was over, the allegations often vanished.”
I hesitate to over-dramatize this, but 30 years ago, Nixon used the criminal justice process to target political enemies — and it was included in his articles of impeachment. If there’s any evidence that the Bush White House did the same thing….