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Thursday, March 22, 2007
The politics of subpoena
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday authorized subpoenas for presidential adviser Karl Rove and other White House and Justice Department officials in its political “investigation” into the firing of eight U.S. attorneys. The subpoena authorization set up a potential constitutional confrontation with President Bush.
The President Bush offered to allow the officials to testify under conditions. Among those is that it would limit the kinds of questions they would answer and responses could not be recorded or transcribed. They would also not respond under oath.
In addition to Karl Rove and Harriett Miers, the House committee wants to interview D. Kyle Sampson, former chief of staff to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, William K. Kelley, the deputy White House counsel and J. Scott Jennings, a special assistant to the president and deputy director of political affairs. The White House agreed to make Rove, Miers, Kelley and Jennings available for private interviews. Those would be limited to communications between the White House and people outside about requests for the U.S. attorneys resignations. Bush said he would invoke executive privilege to prevent aides from testifying publicly under oath.
Bush has not choice now but to fight. He faces two years of politics by subpoena. Feed the sharks now and they’ll be back tomorrow and the day after. Bush’s poll numbers are low — but when it comes to fighting Democrats in Congress, he’s on equal footing. This is a Congress and a party without an agenda — except to trash Bush and the war in Iraq. Ultimately, the country will reject that strategy and the party that pursues it.
