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Fired U.S. Attorney: Bush Administration Turned DOJ into ?Laughingstock?

By Andrew Ramonas

A handful of the U.S. Attorneys fired in 2006 said a Justice Department swayed by politics was to blame for their controversial dismissals, The Associated Press reported Monday.

Five of the nine U.S. Attorneys ousted by the Justice Department under Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said at a forum in Little Rock, Ark., that their dismissals were the result of their former boss’s political devotion to President George W. Bush. Gonzales resigned in 2007.

“There were a number of people who made terrible decisions,” said fired U.S. Attorney John McKay of the Western District of Washington, according to the AP. “They turned the Justice Department into the laughingstock of the country.”

The DOJ in July decided not to file criminal charges in connection with the scandal after a two-year investigation.

McKay was joined at the forum by fired U.S. Attorneys Bud Cummins of the Eastern District of Arkansas, Paul Charlton of Arizona, Carol Lam of California and David Iglesias of New Mexico. U.S. Attorney Daniel Bogden of Utah and former U.S. Attorneys Todd Graves of the Western District of Missouri, Margaret Chiara of the Western District of Michigan and Kevin V. Ryan of the Northern District of California were also dismissed in 2006.

Cummins appeared to indicate that the dismissals would not have happened under John Ashcroft, who was Bush’s first Attorney General.

“Once [Ashcroft's team] left, they just sent people over from the White House to fill these jobs… There was no grown-up there to say, ‘Whoa, this doesn’t work,’ ” Cummins said.

Tim Griffin, who became interim U.S. Attorney in the Eastern District of Arkansas after Cummnins was ousted, was aide to then-Deputy White House Chief of Staff Karl Rove in the White House. He is now running as the Republican nominee for the 2nd Congressional District in Arkansas.

Cummins declined to say whether he would endorse Griffin in the election, according to the AP.

Full post as published by Main Justice on September 21, 2010 (boomark / email).