[NYTr] Gonzo's Gonw Bush Regime's Atty General Resigns

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

The New York Times - Aug 27, 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/27/washington/27cnd-gonzales.html


Embattled Attorney General Resigns

By STEVEN LEE MYERS and PHILIP SHENON

WACO, Tex., Aug. 27 — Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, whose
tenure has been marred by controversy and accusations of perjury before
Congress, announced his resignation in Washington today, declaring that
he had “lived the American dream” by being able to lead the Justice
Department.

Mr. Gonzales, who had rebuffed calls for his resignation for months,
submitted it to President Bush by telephone on Friday, a senior
administration official said. There had been rumblings over the weekend
that Mr. Gonzales’s departure was imminent, although the White House
sought to quell the rumors.

Mr. Gonzales appeared cheerful and composed when he announced that he
was stepping down effective Sept. 17. His very worst days on the job
were “better than my father’s best days,” he said, alluding to his
family’s hardscrabble past.

“Thank you, and God bless America,” Mr. Gonzales said, exiting without
responding to questions.

In Waco, President Bush said he had accepted the resignation
reluctantly. He praised his old friend as “a man of integrity, decency
and principle” and complained of the “months of unfair treatment” that
preceded the resignation.

“It’s sad,” Mr. Bush said, asserting that Mr. Gonzales’s name had been
“dragged through the mud for political reasons.”

The president said the solicitor general, Paul D. Clement, would serve
as acting attorney general until a permanent replacement was chosen.

Mr. Bush has not yet chosen a replacement but will not leave the
position open long, the senior administration official said early this
morning. Among those being mentioned as a possible successor were
Michael Chertoff, the secretary of homeland security who is a former
federal prosecutor, assistant attorney general and federal judge;
Christopher Cox, the head of the Securities and Exchange Commission;
and Larry D. Thompson, a former deputy attorney general who is now
senior vice president and general counsel of PepsiCo Inc.

Mr. Bush repeatedly stood by Mr. Gonzales, an old friend and colleague
from Texas, even as Mr. Gonzales faced increasing scrutiny for his
leadership of the Justice Department over issues including his role in
the dismissals of nine United States attorneys late last year and
whether he testified truthfully about the National Security Agency’s
surveillance programs.

Earlier this month, at a news conference, Mr. Bush dismissed
accusations that Mr. Gonzales had stonewalled or misled a congressional
inquiry. “We’re watching a political exercise,” Mr. Bush said. “I mean,
this is a man who has testified, he’s sent thousands of papers up
there. There’s no proof of wrong.”

But Democrats cheered Mr. Gonzales’s departure. “Alberto Gonzales was
never the right man for this job,” said Senator Harry Reid of Nevada,
the majority leader. “He lacked independence, he lacked judgment, and
he lacked the spine to say ‘no’ to Karl Rove.”

Senator Charles E. Schumer, the New York Democrat who sits on the
Judiciary Committee and has been calling for Mr. Gonzales’s resignation
for months, said this morning: “It has been a long and difficult
struggle, but at last the attorney general has done the right thing and
stepped down. For the previous six months, the Justice Department has
been virtually nonfunctional, and desperately needs new leadership.”

Senator Schumer said that “Democrats will not obstruct or impede a
nominee who we are confident will put the rule of law above political
considerations.”

Another Democrat on the Judiciary Committee who has been highly
critical of Mr. Gonzales, Senator Russell D. Feingold of Wisconsin,
said the next attorney general must be a person whose first loyalty is
“to the law, not the president.”

Mr. Gonzales’s resignation is the latest in a series of high-level
departures that has reshaped the end of Mr. Bush’s second term. Mr.
Rove, the political adviser who is another of Mr. Bush’s close circle
of aides from Texas, stepped down two weeks ago.

The official who disclosed the resignation in advance today said that
the turmoil over Mr. Gonzales had made it difficult for him to continue
as attorney general. “The unfair treatment that he’s been on the
receiving end of has been a distraction for the department,” the
official said.

A senior administration official said today that Mr. Gonzales, who was
in Washington, had called the president in Crawford, Tex., on Friday to
offer his resignation. The president rebuffed the offer, but said the
two should talk face to face on Sunday.

Mr. Gonzales and his wife flew to Texas, and over lunch on Sunday the
president accepted the resignation with regret, the official said.

On Saturday night Mr. Gonzales was contacted by his press spokesman to
ask how the department should respond to inquiries from reporters about
rumors of his resignation, and he told the spokesman to deny the
reports.

White House spokesmen also insisted on Sunday that they did not believe
that Mr. Gonzales was planning to resign. Aides to senior members of
the Senate Judiciary Committee said over the weekend that they had
received no suggestion from the administration that Mr. Gonzales
intended to resign.

As late as Sunday afternoon, Mr. Gonzales himself was denying through
his spokesman that he was quitting. The spokesman, Brian Rohrekasse,
said Sunday that he telephoned the attorney general about the reports
of his imminent resignation “and he said it wasn’t true — so I don’t
know what more I can say.”

Steven Lee Myers reported from Waco, Texas, and Philip Shenon reported
from Washington.

Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company