WHAT WE HEARD FROM THE ATTORNEY GENERAL
In January of last year, then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee at hearings to decide whether he should be confirmed as Attorney General of the United States. Going into those hearings, I had an open mind -- unlike with judicial nominations, a president should have wide latitude to appoint who he wants to advise him.
After his testimony before the Committee, however, it was apparent that Judge Gonzales does not have the abiding respect for the rule of law that our country needs in its Attorney General. Too often, he seemed to view the law as an obstacle to navigate around rather than something he was required to uphold. And so I voted against his confirmation. After what we have learned in the past seven weeks since the NSA wiretapping story appeared in the New York Times, and after the Attorney General's appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday, I am more convinced than ever my vote was correct.
At yesterday’s hearing, I reminded the Attorney General about his testimony during his confirmation hearings in January 2005, when I asked him whether the President had the power to authorize warrantless wiretaps in violation of the criminal law. We didn't know it then, but the President had authorized the NSA program three years before, when the Attorney General was White House Counsel. At his confirmation hearing, the Attorney General first tried to dismiss my question as "hypothetical" before stating "it's not the policy or the agenda of this President to authorize actions that would be in contravention of our criminal statutes." Yesterday, he tried to claim that he had told the truth at that hearing, bringing the parsing of words to new lows. I think it is clear that the Attorney General misled the Committee and the public not only about the NSA wiretapping program but about his views on presidential power. That broader issue was central to the debate over his nomination.
The Attorney General's lack of candor adds to the already mounting credibility problem that this Administration faces. One of the things I tried to do in my second round of questions yesterday was to point out how incomplete and misleading the President's comments on the NSA program in the State of the Union address were.
This administration reacts to anyone who questions this illegal program by saying that those of us who demand the truth and stand up for our rights and freedoms somehow has a pre-9/11 world view. In fact, the President has a pre-1776 world view. Our government has three branches, not one. And no one, not even the President, is above the law.
