Democracy for New Mexico

Barnett and Rogers Implicated (Again) in Rove's Plan to Keep Minorities Off Voter Rolls

Facts be damned. No matter how much evidence undermines the validity of the Republican "voter fraud" claims, they keep on insisting there's a "there" there. And they keep sticking to their odd view that, for some strange reason, certain Republican U.S. Attorneys -- many of whom have since been fired by BushCo -- didn't want to prosecute "voter fraud" even though evidence was supposedly abundant. It's never really been explained why any U.S. Attorney would avoid issuing headline-grabbing indictments if the cases could be made.

The truth is that BushCo wanted these prosecutions in battleground states despite there being no real evidence of crimes -- and they were dedicated to applying political pressure to get them even if they weren't justified. Politics is politics and political gain often seems to be the only goal of Rove et al. What's a little destruction of the integrity and ethics of the U.S. Justice Department when Congressional seats are at stake? One of the top priorities of Rove's strategy for the last few election cycles was to disenfranchise minority voters and discourage them from registering to vote. After all, minority voters tend to vote for Democrats. Creating the "voter fraud" myth and launching headline-making investigations were a big part of Rove's plan, and pressure was applied liberally to U.S. Attorneys who were reluctant to play ball.

Wa-Po Piece Debunks "Voter Fraud"
In a Washington Post op-ed this week, Harold Meyerson debunks the long-running Repub "voter fraud" myth in no uncertain terms. Quote:

... five of the 12 federal prosecutors either sacked or considered for sacking last year had been singled out by Rove and other administration officials for nonperformance on voter fraud. Amazingly, all five came from states -- Missouri, Nevada, New Mexico, Washington and Wisconsin -- where Republicans were embroiled in tight election contests.

With the home office in Washington breathing down their necks, why did these experienced prosecutors fail to bring voter fraud indictments? The crime, after all, had become a major Justice Department concern. Starting in 2002, Justice required every U.S. attorney to designate a district election officer, whose job it would be to end this epidemic of electoral fraud. These officers' attendance was required at annual training seminars, where they were taught how to investigate, prosecute and convict fraudulent voters. The statutes were adequate; the investigators were primed, well funded and raring to go.

And nothing happened. For the simple reason that when it comes to voter fraud in America, there's no there there. Voter fraud is a myth -- not an urban or rural myth, as such, but a Republican one. [emphasis mine]

...  to prosecute or convict more than a handful of people for voter fraud isn't for lack of trying. Since 2002, the Justice Department's Ballot Access and Voting Integrity Initiative has, as Gonzales put it, "made enforcement of election fraud and corruption offenses a top priority." And yet between October 2002 and September 2005, just 38 cases were brought nationally, and of those, 14 ended in dismissals or acquittals, 11 in guilty pleas, and 13 in convictions.

... And thus, as has so often been the case in the Bush presidency, a government department was instructed to negate its raison d'etre. Just as consumer protection and environmental protection agencies were transformed into agencies protecting manufacturers and despoilers, so Justice -- whose imperishable glory was its role in extending the franchise to African Americans during the civil rights years -- was told that its new mission was to suppress the franchise.

Rogers and Barnett Work the Rove Strategy
Now evidence is mounting that local Repub political operatives Pat Rogers (right) and Mickey Barnett (below left) were, in essence, part of an organized effort in New Mexico to pressure Iglesias to help carry out Rove's strategy.

Barnett was once a legislative aid to Sen. Domenici and was his pick for a slot on the U.S. Postal Service Board of Governors. A former NM Senator, Barnett has also lobbied on behalf of the payday loan industry, Corrections Corporation of Amerca and gambling interests. Albuquerque attorney Patrick Rogers served on the board of the American Center for Voting Rights Legislative Fund, which has ties to The Donatelli group involved in the Swiftboat plot during the 2004 election. He testified about "voter fraud" and the need for voter ID at a U.S House Administration Committee hearing organized by fromer Repub Rep. Bob Ney, who later was jailed for crimes connected with the Abramoff scandal.

In a in yesterday's LA Times, David Iglesias describes a politicized lunch where Rogers once again applied the pressure:

Weeks before the 2006 midterm election, then-New Mexico U.S. Atty. David C. Iglesias was invited to dine with a well-connected Republican lawyer in Albuquerque who had been after him for years to prosecute allegations of voter fraud.

"I had a bad feeling about that lunch," said Iglesias, describing his meeting at Pappadeaux Seafood Kitchen with Patrick Rogers, a lawyer who provided occasional counsel to the New Mexico Republican Party.

When the voter fraud issue came up, Iglesias said, he explained to Rogers that in reviewing more than 100 complaints, he hadn't found any solid enough to justify criminal charges.

... Rogers, Iglesias recalled, had pressed him in 2004 and then again just before the 2006 election to push for voter fraud convictions in the state. Iglesias said he was so concerned about the propriety of the preelection get-together with Rogers that he asked a colleague from the office to join him as a witness.

Sour Grapes When Iglesias Won't Cooperate
As it became more and more clear that Iglesias wouldn't go along with the "voter fraud" charade, complaints by Rogers, Barnett and Sen. Pete Domenici bombarded the Justice Department and White House, urging that Iglesias be replaced. The plot thickens and "all roads lead to Rove."

Unbeknownst to Iglesias, a few months before that lunch, Rogers and another Republican attorney from New Mexico, Mickey Barnett, had complained about Iglesias at the Justice Department in Washington. The session was arranged with the assistance of the department's then-White House liaison, Monica M. Goodling, and an aide to White House political strategist Karl Rove, according to e-mails released recently by congressional investigators.

One of those they met with was Matthew Friedrich, a senior counselor to Gonzales. Friedrich would meet again with Rogers and Barnett in New Mexico, where, he told congressional investigators, the pair complained about Iglesias. They made it clear "that they did not want him to be the U.S. attorney…. They mentioned that they had communicated that with Sen. Domenici, and they also mentioned Karl Rove," Friedrich said, according to a transcript provided by congressional investigators.

... Iglesias has said that he believes "all roads lead to Rove" in explaining the dismissals and that he is counting on the Office of Special Counsel to find the truth.

Obstruction of Justice?
Another fired U.S. Attorney says the political pressure could merit a criminal investigation:

This week, another fired U.S. attorney who has said he felt pressure on voter fraud cases, John McKay of Seattle, said he thought interference with Iglesias and other prosecutors amounted to "possible obstruction of justice." He predicted that a criminal inquiry would be launched. He said he felt pressure to bring voter fraud charges in his district after a 129-vote margin put a Democratic governor into office in Washington.

Remember that both Sen. Domenici and Rep. Heather Wilson made phone calls to Iglesias in the run-up to the 2006 election that he perceived to be intimidating. Clearly, a message was being sent to Iglesias and other recalcitrant U.S. Attorneys that they must proceed with politically motivated indictments and investigations about "voter fraud" and other matters or face the wrath of the DOJ and Rove. Those who didn't respond were put on the to-be-fired list.

Domenici Pushes Rogers to Replace Iglesias
A final "irony": Pat Rogers was one of the names reportedly submitted by Domenici as a suggested replacement for Iglesias. I guess Rogers did such a good job keeping the pressure on Iglesias that Domenici believed he deserved a reward, like any good flunky.

Rove in the Crosshairs in DOJ Scandal

You remember "voter fraud," the fictional problem concocted by Repubs to provide a tool they could use to suppress and purge Dem voters and those who were dedicated to registering them. One of the main excuses used by those who went after U.S. Attorney David Iglesias and the others was that they were allegedly refusing to prosecute massive "voter fraud" cases in the run-up to the 2004 and 2006 elections. All research findings to the contrary, the Repubs persist to this day in insisting that voter fraud on the part of Dems is rampant. Why let facts get in the way of a useful Repub political tactic?

Now it turns out that Rove was the Repub operative orchestrating this effort -- from inside the White House. New information shows that Rove led an attempt to manipulate the Department of Justice so that U.S. Attorneys in battleground states, including Iglesias, would either have to agree to prosecute these baseless "voter fraud" cases or risk being fired. Always ready to subvert democracy to benefit BushCo, Rove had no qualms about using the DOJ to try and tamp down Dem voting in areas where such tactics might well make a difference. Like the 2006 Wilson-Madrid race in NM that was ultimately decided by fewer than 900 votes.

Harper's Magazine states:

The McClatchy Newspapers report today that in the final weeks before the midterm Congressional elections of November 2006, presidential political advisor Karl Rove orchestrated a large-scale effort to suppress voter turnout among potentially Democratic constituencies, leveraging Department of Justice resources in the process. Key to the project were P. Kyle Sampson, Alberto Gonzales’s chief of staff, and Matthew Friedrich, then chief of staff in the Department’s Criminal Division.

Friedrich’s testimony and statements to Congressional investigators made clear that the decision to proceed with “voter fraud” charges in a series of dubious cases resulted from direction from partisan political operatives in the White House, including Rove.

As the McClatchy story relates:

While it was known that Rove and the White House had complained about prosecutors not aggressively investigating voter fraud, Friedrich's testimony suggests that the Justice Department itself was under pressure to open voter fraud cases despite a department policy that discourages such action so close to an election.

Greg Palast Has 550 "Missing" Emails from the RoveTeam
Also be sure to read the entire Democracy Now report by Greg Palast (transcript and audio), which details his recent telephone interviews with David Igelsias and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. about the scandal. Excerpt:

GREG PALAST: Rove flew to New Mexico just before the [2006] election and got an earful of complaints about Iglesias from state party chiefs. Rove reported to President Bush, who personally put the heat on Attorney General Gonzales. Iglesias was stunned.

DAVID IGLESIAS: I had no idea that a few local yokels in New Mexico would have enough stroke to get the President to complain.

GREG PALAST: There was more than failing to help the Wilson campaign. In the 2004 presidential election, Republican operatives blocked a quarter-million new voters nationwide from voting on grounds they brought the wrong IDs to the poles. To justify this massive blockade, Republican officials wanted Iglesias to arrest some voters to create a high publicity show trial. Iglesias went along with the game. Just before the 2004 election, he held a press conference announcing the creation of a vote fraud task force. But the prosecutor drew the line at arresting innocent voters.

DAVID IGLESIAS: They were telling Rove that I wasn’t doing their bidding. I wasn't filing these voter fraud cases.

GREG PALAST: The evidence fellow Republicans gave him was junk. He refused to bring a single prosecution.

DAVID IGLESIAS: It was the old throwing pasta at the wall trick, that he’s throwing up pasta. Something’s got to stick, and it didn't.

GREG PALAST: For failing to bring the voting cases, Iglesias paid with his job.

DAVID IGLESIAS: They wanted a political operative who happened to be a US attorney, and when they got somebody who actually took his oath to the Constitution seriously, they were appalled and they wanted me out of there. The two strikes against me was, I was not political, I didn't help them out on their bogus voter fraud prosecutions.

GREG PALAST: Rove personally ordered his removal. As a prosecutor, Iglesias says that if missing emails prove the firing was punishment for failure to bring bogus charges, Mr. Rove himself is in legal trouble.

DAVID IGLESIAS: If his intent was, look what happened with Iglesias, if that was his intent, he’s in big trouble. That is obstruction of justice, one classic example [emphasis mine].

After reviewing Palast's cache of misdirected email from RoveCo, voting rights attorney Kennedy had this to say:

ROBERT F. KENNEDY, JR.: They ought to be in jail for doing this, because they knew it was illegal, and they did it anyway.

GREG PALAST: What is it that was so obviously illegal that law professor Kennedy thought they deserved prison time? The evidence that shook him was attached to fifty of the secret emails, something that GOP party chiefs called caging lists, thousands of names of voters. Notably, the majority were African American. Kennedy explained how caging worked.

ROBERT F. KENNEDY, JR.: Caging is an illegal way of getting rid of black votes. You get a list of all the black voters. Then you send a letter to their homes. And if the person doesn't sign it at the homes, the letter then is returned to the Republican National Committee. They then direct the state attorney general, who is friendly to them, who’s Republican, to remove that voter from the list on the alleged basis that that voter does not live in the address that they designated as their address on the voting application form.

GREG PALAST: In all, the Republican Party challenged nearly three million voters, a mass attack on minority voting rights virtually unreported in the US press.

ROBERT F. KENNEDY, JR.: So they disenfranchised millions of black voters who don't even know that they’ve been disenfranchised.

GREG PALAST: Page after page of voters with this address, Naval Air Station, Jacksonville, hundreds, thousands of soldiers and sailors targeted to lose their vote. Go to Baghdad, lose your vote.

And what does this have to do with the prosecutor firings? Take a look at the name at the top of the secret missing email: Tim Griffin. This is the man in charge of the allegedly illegal caging operation. He is research director for the Republican National Committee, special assistant to Karl Rove, and as of December 7 Karl Rove's personal pick for US attorney for the state of Arkansas. Is this a case of the perpetrator becomes the prosecutor?

America Votes Says: Sign Petition to Get Wilson and Domenici to Testify Under Oath

This is a guest blog from Jennifer Ford, NM State Director of America Votes, who spoke at this month's DFA-DFNM Meetup:

It was great to be in a room with so many energized progressives at the last Democracy for New Mexico meeting!

My name is Jennifer Ford and I am the New Mexico State Director with America Votes. America Votes serves 37 national and more than 260 state-based partner organizations. This historic partnership represents a combined membership of more than 20 million Americans across the country. Groups that are a part of the America Votes coalition work on a broad range of issues including the environment, civil and human rights, choice, education and labor. 

Yesterday, in the wake of Attorney General Gonzales’ testimony in front of the House Judiciary Committee, I wanted to take this opportunity to highlight one of our partners, New Mexicans for Truth.  This grassroots group of New Mexicans is dedicated to finding out the truth about Heather Wilson and Pete Domenici’s role in the firing of U.S. Attorney David Iglesias. Both public officials allegedly made calls to Iglesias to pressure him about the metro courthouse indictments.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales testified in front of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee that "if a member of Congress contacts a US attorney to put pressure on one specific case, that is a very, very serious issue..."  Yesterday, testifying in front of the U.S. House Judiciary Committee Gonzales told the panel that he doesn’t recall any more details on the firings.  In fact, Attorney General Gonzales said he couldn’t recall specific conversations or details in response to more than 70 questions. See this CNN article.

Since he has not been able to clear up the questions surrounding this scandal, the logical next step is for Heather Wilson and Pete Domenici to testify under oath about their conversations. 

New Mexicans for Truth has started a website to find out whether or not Wilson and Domenici pressured U.S. Attorney Iglesias as a way to win public support for Wilson’s extremely tight re-election campaign – a campaign that she won by only 900 votes.

If you are concerned about this issue, go to https://www.peteandheathercomeclean.com  and sign the petition asking Rep. Wilson and Senator Domenici to testify under oath.  Both Domenici and Wilson have repeatedly declined to testify under oath about the timing of the calls. This, above all else, has made it harder for New Mexicans to learn the truth about their Justice Department, and whether politics interfered with the law enforcement process.

Please sign the petition and pass it along to concerned friends:

https://www.peteandheathercomeclean.com.

As progressives we are stronger when we work together and I look forward to working with DFA to further a progressive agenda in New Mexico. 

Jennifer Ford
New Mexico State Director
America Votes
jford@americavotes.org
505-266-2505 ext. 111

Editor's Note: This is a guest blog from Jennifer Ford. Guest blogs provide our readers with an opportunity to express their opinions and share information on relevant political issues. If you'd like to submit a piece for consideration as a guest blog, contact me by clicking on the Email Me link on the upper left-hand corner of the main page.

Iglesias Points to Rove, Special Counsel Responds

Once again, all roads lead to Rove (who also doesn't believe in global warming and hates it when Sheryl Crowe touches him). This L.A. Times article reports that the Office of the Special Counsel will be investigating Rove and other elements of the Bush administration's political operation in the White House:

... the Office of Special Counsel is preparing to jump into one of the most sensitive and potentially explosive issues in Washington, launching a broad investigation into key elements of the White House political operations that for more than six years have been headed by chief strategist Karl Rove.

The new investigation, which will examine the firing of at least one U.S. attorney, missing White House e-mails, and White House efforts to keep presidential appointees attuned to Republican political priorities, could create a substantial new problem for the Bush White House.

... The question of improper political influence over government decision-making is at the heart of the controversy over the firing of U.S. attorneys and the ongoing congressional investigation of the special e-mail system installed in the White House and other government offices by the Republican National Committee.

... [Scott J.] Bloch [head of the Office of the Special Counsel] said the new investigation grew from two narrower inquiries his staff had begun in recent weeks. One involved the fired U.S. attorney from New Mexico, David C. Iglesias. The other centered on a PowerPoint presentation that a Rove aide, J. Scott Jennings, made at the General Services Administration this year. [emphasis mine]

Responding to Alberto Gonzales' testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee last week, David Iglesias has pointed a finger directly at Rove, accusing him of being behind the firings. From McClatchy Newspapers:

Gonzales' testimony Thursday left senators convinced he wasn't behind the plan or its execution and in fact knew far less than a department head should have about the details. Former and current members of Gonzales' staff who've been interviewed by congressional investigators also have said their roles were limited or nonexistent.  Absent another explanation, the signs point to the White House and, at least in some degree, to the president's political adviser, Karl Rove.

David Iglesias, the former New Mexico U.S. attorney and one of the eight fired last year, said investigating the White House's role is the logical next step - one that would follow existing clues about Rove's involvement.

"If I were Congress, I would say, `If the attorney general doesn't have answers, then who would?' There's enough evidence to indicate that Karl Rove was involved up to his eyeballs."

Iglesias said another clue that the White House may have been the driving force is the relative lack of Justice Department documentation for the firings in the 6,000 pages of documents turned over to Congress.

"If you want to justify getting rid of someone, you should have at least some paper trail," Iglesias said. "There's been a remarkable absence of that. I'm wondering if the paper trail is at the White House."

Yup, if Gonzales and his staffers don't know (or won't say) how the list was created, who does that leave as the culprit in selecting the U.S. attorneys that needed firing? You don't think Bush came up with it on his own, do you? Political decisions based on political considerations (virtually all decisions in the Bush administration) would naturally be made by the main political operative in the White House -- Karl Rove. No wonder The Decider doesn't want Rove to testify under oath. And no wonder Rove "lost" all those emails. Can it get any more obvious?

At last, it looks like a wide-ranging and cohesive investigation will look into the possible illegalities committed by political operative Rove and his inside-the-White-House campaign office. Let's hope Scott Bloch is true to his word on how deep and comprehensive his probe will be. Don't hold your breath, though. Bloch may be another Gonzales, ready to cover for his bosses, according to this.

Number Of White House Officials Allowed To Intervene In DoJ Cases Jumps By 10,325 Percent

Think Progress has video and a transcript of an amazing exchange between Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) and Gonzales from yesterday's Senate Judiciary Committee hearing. Go see. Talk about compare and contrast ...

Gonzales Squirms

You can listen to the Senate Judiciary hearing with AG Alberto Gonzales on NPR radio or watch it on C-SPAN 3 TV (which will probably repeat it tonight). These sources also have coverage on their websites. In fact, C-SPAN.org already has a download available of this morning's session. Here's their special page devoted to the attorney firings, which contains numerous links to news, documents and videos. Here's the NPR.org website.

I watched an early portion of today's Gonzales hearing and my first reaction was that he isn't smirking much anymore. You know the infamous smirk. It usually appears when Gonzales is being coy with the facts. This morning, however, the smirk was much more rare, replaced with grimacing, sweating, fumbling, mumbling, knocking into the microphone and squirming in his seat as he got grilled on his involvement in the firing of eight U.S. Attorneys. In the part I watched, Sen. Arlen Specter was the roughest on Alberto -- breaking in repeatedly to contest what Gonzales was saying and pressuring him to answer the questions. He also stated that Alberto's opening testimony continued “a pattern of not being candid.”

Gonzales' fall back line appears to be, "I can't recall," and he's using it often. He's also claiming that his involvement with evaluating and criticizing some of those fired was somehow separate from "the process" used to decide which attorneys to can that was led by his Deputy, Kyle Sampson. Gonzales says his criticisms were merely part of his usual job of supervising the attorneys. Right. Talk about desperate compartmentalizing.

According to a report on NPR.org:

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales' claim that he had only a limited role in the firing of eight U.S. attorneys was challenged repeatedly Thursday by Democrats and Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee. In a highly contentious hearing, Gonzales insisted that the firings were proper and not part of a political effort to interfere with ongoing prosecutions.

But lawmakers from both parties appeared incredulous at Gonzales' failure to recall numerous meetings and discussions that led up to the firings, and his insistence that he relied on subordinates at the Justice Department in coming up with the list of who should be fired.

As to the firing of David Iglesias:

Gonzales also acknowledged that he had had a conversation with White House political adviser Karl Rove and President Bush about complaints that former U.S. attorney David Iglesias was not pursuing voter fraud cases more aggressively in New Mexico. But Gonzales said he did not know how and when Iglesias' name was added to the list of those recommended for firing, although he said he was not "surprised" to see the name there.

Good for the Goose But Not for the Gander?
Another bone of contention? Gonzales claims that U.S. Attorney Carol Lam of San Diego was fired in part because she wasn't getting enough illegal immigration convictions in her border state, and that she was devoting too much time to white collar crime. At the same time, Iglesias reportedly was shut down on his request to hire more attorneys to conduct illegal immigration cases because the Justice Department wanted him to concentrate on white collar crime.

Does that mean that New Mexico isn't considered a border state with numerous illegal immigration problems, just like Southern California? Or just that Bush's Justice Department was interested in pursuing white collar crime only if those indicted were primarily Democrats, as was the case with Iglesias and the courthouse indictments? Remember, it was Carol Lam who prosecuted the outrageous corruption of Repub Rep. Duke Cunningham. She was fired, it just so happens, when the corruption case widened to include subpoenas of other powerful Republicans. Iglesias, on the other hand, was berated for not going fast enough on indictments that primarily targeted Democrats. It's been widely reported that indictments of Democrats have heavily outnumbered indictments of Republicans in recent years. Reeks of politics to me.

The NPR.org site also has links to selected audio clips of the testimony today.

Domenici Got Bush Involved in Iglesias Firing

A copyrighted story in Sunday's Albuquerque Journal is getting big play in the media and on the net. Entitled "Domenici Sought Iglesias Ouster," the article's opening paragraph reveals for the first time that Bush was involved in the decision to fire Iglesias, at the direct request of Sen. Domenici:

Former U.S. Attorney David Iglesias was fired after Sen. Pete Domenici, who had been unhappy with Iglesias for some time, made a personal appeal to the White House, the Journal has learned.

The article explains the process this way:

In the spring of 2006, Domenici told Gonzales he wanted Iglesias out. Gonzales refused. He told Domenici he would fire Iglesias only on orders from the president.

At some point after the election last Nov. 6, Domenici called Bush's senior political adviser, Karl Rove, and told him he wanted Iglesias out and asked Rove to take his request directly to the president.

Domenici and Bush subsequently had a telephone conversation about the issue. The conversation between Bush and Domenici occurred sometime after the election but before the firings of Iglesias and six other U.S. attorneys were announced on Dec. 7. [emphasis mine]

Iglesias' name wasn't on an October 2006 list of U.S. Attorneys to be fired. In October, a few weeks before the November 6th election, Domenici phoned Iglesias at home and asked if indictments in the metro court investigation would be issued before the election. Iglesias said no. Iglesias' name suddenly appeared on another version of the list dated November 15, 2006. Domenici had called Rove after the election, then called Bush. Given what Gonzales told Domenici as reported in the Journal story -- that he'd fire Iglesias only on the order of the president -- it's logical to assume that Bush must have given an order to fire Iglesias sometime between November 6th and November 15th, when the list was created.

As Josh Marshall writes at Talking Points Memo:

No one disputes that Domenici's call to Iglesias was at best inappropriate. But there's been a lack of direct evidence that Iglesias's refusal to bow to political pressure led directly to his firing. Now we have that evidence. And it's not Kyle Sampson or even Alberto Gonzales whom Domenici went to to get sign off for Iglesias's ouster. It was right to the president. And the available evidence now points strongly to the conclusion that the final decision to fire David Iglesias came from the President of the United States.

Political motivation for Domenici's calls and Iglesias' firing? You might say.

Marshall also reports on an interesting exchange from today's White House press gaggle. And just think, AG Alberto Gonzales is set to testify under oath to Congress tomorrow.

DCCC Launches 'Heather Wilson Watch'

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) today launched a new website, Heather Wilson Watch, chronicling the role played by Rep Heather Wilson (R-NM1)i n the firing of former U.S. Attorney David Iglesias. There are serious and unresolved differences between Wilson’s political statement and Mr. Iglesias’ testimony under oath:

“I received a call from Heather Wilson. She said ‘what can you tell me about sealed indictments.’ The second she said any questions about sealed indictments, red flags went up in my head, because as you know, we cannot talk about indictments until they’re made public. In general, we specifically cannot talk about a sealed indictment.” -- David Iglesias

“A federal prosecutor was fired only after he refused to bend to Heather Wilson’s political pressure,” said Jennifer Crider, Communications Director at the DCCC. “Heather Wilson needs to quit playing games and tell the truth about her role in the U.S. Attorney scandal. The website Heather Wilson Watch will hold Wilson accountable for her refusal to come clean about why she tried to interfere in a federal investigation and her role in getting Iglesias fired.”

Pressure is expected to continue to get Wilson, Sen. Domenici and others to tell the truth on the record about their roles in the scandal. An article in The Hill reports:

Kyle Sampson’s testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee last week suggests that congressional pressure may have played a significant role in the firing of a New Mexico prosecutor.

Statements from Sampson, who served as chief of staff to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales before resigning last month, to the Judiciary Committee last Thursday are placing additional pressure on New Mexico GOP Sen. Pete Domenici and Rep. Heather Wilson, as well as Gonzales, White House political adviser Karl Rove and ex-White House counsel Harriet Miers, to explain what roles, if any, they played in the firing of U.S. Attorney David Iglesias, according to legal experts.

... Justice Department e-mails and Sampson’s testimony also show that sometime between Oct. 17 and Election Day, Iglesias’s name was added to the list along with three names that were redacted in the e-mails.

Domenici and Wilson, who was running in a tight reelection race, called Iglesias just a few weeks prior to the Nov. 7 election.

Earlier this week, protestors showed up outside Rep. Wilson's "state of the district" appearance before the Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce to urge her to come clean on her role in the scandal. So far, Wilson has stuck to her story that her call to Iglesias just prior to the November 2006 election was "entirely appropriate." Well, only if you go by the politically poisoned standards of the Bush administration and its cronies.

The Senate Ethics Committee has opened an investigation into Domenici's role in Iglesias' firing.  Members of the House ethics panel won't comment on whether they’ve launched a probe.

To update yourselves on the facts of this scandal, check out the DCCC's timeline covering Wilson's involvement.

Hey Heather, Tell the Truth

This radio ad put together by the DCCC will run for five days in New Mexico. It confronts Rep. Heather Wilson (R, NM-1) on what fired U.S. Attorney David Iglesias has testified under oath was a pressuring phone call regarding an ongoing, alleged New Mexico corruption case:

Wilson has repeated said that the call was entirely "appropriate." I guess that depends on the kind of standards of conduct you apply to making that judgment. Anyone applying common sense and a conscience would probably come to a different conclusion.

Fortunately, as far as we know, it's still a relatively rare occurence when a powerful politician feels justified in directly confronting a U.S. Attorney on a potentially explosive, politically important, active investigation, and doing so right before a close election -- in fact -- the caller's own election. Then again, most politicians haven't felt shielded from the consequences of such an action by an administration and Justice Department that's been dangerously politicized by the President's right-hand political operative, Karl Rove.

Here's the text version of the ad:

“Testified” – 60 second Radio

October, 2006
A phone call is made … a scandal begins.

According to testimony from the United States Senate Judiciary Committee, Congresswoman Heather Wilson called U.S. Attorney David Iglesias and pressured him concerning a federal corruption investigation.

Listen to U.S. Attorney Igelsias’ testimony before the Committee…

“I received a call from Heather Wilson.” “She said ‘what can you tell me about sealed indictments.’ The second she said any questions about sealed indictments, red flags went up in my head, because as you know, we cannot talk about indictments until they’re made public, in general, we specifically cannot talk about a sealed indictment.”

Serious questions remain about Heather Wilson and violation of Congressional ethics rules.

It’s time for Heather Wilson to release her phone records and come clean.

It’s time for Heather Wilson to tell the full truth.

Announcer: Paid for by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, www.dccc.org. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is responsible for the content of this advertising.

Iglesias: Why I Was Fired

Fired U.S. Attorney David Iglesias makes his case in a New York Times op-ed. After reviewing the documents released by the Justice Department, he concludes the evidence is clear that he was fired not for job performance issues, but for political reasons. Iglesias ends by saying, "only a written retraction by the Justice Department setting the record straight regarding my performance would settle the issue for me." Excerpts:

United States attorneys have a long history of being insulated from politics. Although we receive our appointments through the political process (I am a Republican who was recommended by Senator Pete Domenici), we are expected to be apolitical once we are in office. I will never forget John Ashcroft, then the attorney general, telling me during the summer of 2001 that politics should play no role during my tenure. I took that message to heart. Little did I know that I could be fired for not being political.

Politics entered my life with two phone calls that I received last fall, just before the November election. One came from Representative Heather Wilson and the other from Senator Domenici, both Republicans from my state, New Mexico.

As for the continued yammering by Bush-Rove-Gonzales apologists that Iglesias was incompetent or worse in "refusing" to issue indictments for alleged "voter fraud" crimes in New Mexico, he says:

As this story has unfolded these last few weeks, much has been made of my decision to not prosecute alleged voter fraud in New Mexico. Without the benefit of reviewing evidence gleaned from F.B.I. investigative reports, party officials in my state have said that I should have begun a prosecution. What the critics, who don’t have any experience as prosecutors, have asserted is reprehensible — namely that I should have proceeded without having proof beyond a reasonable doubt. The public has a right to believe that prosecution decisions are made on legal, not political, grounds.

... After reviewing more than 100 complaints of voter fraud, I felt there was one possible case that should be prosecuted federally. I worked with the F.B.I. and the Justice Department’s public integrity section. As much as I wanted to prosecute the case, I could not overcome evidentiary problems. The Justice Department and the F.B.I. did not disagree with my decision in the end not to prosecute.