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In a dramatic development that could shake the political leadership of  the Justice Department, career lawyer Christopher Coates has sent a letter to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights offering to testify Friday on matters related to the controversial New Black Panthers voter-intimidation case. Click here, or on the screen capture below to read Coates’ letter in PDF form:Ten months ago, Coates — the award-winning former chief of the Voting Section of the Civil Rights Division — was subpoenaed by the Commission to testify about the case. He was subsequently instructed by DOJ officials to ignore the subpoena.Within the...

The hypocrisy of the Obama Justice Department has reached staggering proportions on a host of issues stemming from the New Black Panther voter-intimidation case. Such systemic evasion of justice breeds lawlessness. The Justice Department's latest thumb in the eye of its critics came in an Aug. 11 letter from Assistant Attorney General Thomas E. Perez to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. Mr. Perez told the commission that he will continue blocking testimony from veteran civil rights attorney Christopher Coates because Mr. Coates' stationing in South Carolina since mid-January means he is not "the appropriate witness to testify regarding current...

The continuing DOJ refusal to allow attorney Christopher Coates to testify on the case results in a heated Commission hearing. In an explosive and raucous hearing on August 13, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights voted 5-3 to officially ask Congress to expand its investigatory powers. This action came as a result of U.S. Justice Department stonewalling regarding the dismissal of a voter intimidation case against members of the New Black Panther Party.The commission meeting was dominated by discussion of the DOJ’s continued muzzling of career attorney Christopher Coates, who was head of the DOJ Voting Rights section when the...

Washington (CNN) -- Members of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission shouted at each other Friday over the Justice Department's decision to drop most of the charges in a 2008 incident in which black militants confronted voters at a Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, polling place, leading to charges of voter intimidation. Conservative commission members accused the Justice Department of "stonewalling" the commission's investigation into the dismissal, and called a Justice Department's response to requests for information "breathtaking and insulting." A liberal commission member, in turn, dismissed those complaints as the "last gasps of a conservative majority of this commission." At the end of...

The federal government's dismissal of voter intimidation charges against the New Black Panther Party has not only stirred debate at the national level and among various media outlets, but created a firestorm within the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, which has announced a separate investigation of the matter. In a statement, five Republican and independent commission members — describing themselves as "conservative-leaning colleagues" — took issue with comments by Commission Vice Chairman Abigail Thernstrom, also a Republican appointee, who called the New Black Panther Party probe "politically motivated." "Our fellow member of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, Abigail Thernstrom,...

Abigail Thernstrom, vice chair of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, has written what Pete Kirsanow aptly described as a "bewildering" response to my column of a week earlier. I had taken issue with Thernstrom's absurd claim that the Justice Department's dismissal of the New Black Panthers voter intimidation case is "small potatoes." I haven't gotten around to replying yet, but Pete (Thernstrom's fellow commmissioner) and former Justice Department official Hans von Spakovsky (Thernstrom's friend) have both demolished Thernstrom's response.There remain a few more things to say, but for now, I have a pressing question for Dr. Thernstrom: Are you serious?In her NRO...

Abby Thernstrom is my friend and we usually agree on voting matters, but I have to say with due respect to her that her view of the New Black Panther Party voter intimidation case is wrong for a number of reasons, from her characterization of the evidence in the case to a misunderstanding of the applicable legal standards. On the other hand, Commissioner Thernstrom seems to have backed off somewhat on some issues in her latest posting at National Review. Whether or not this is because of the sharp criticism by Andy McCarthy, it is hard to tell, although I...

The ongoing investigation of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights is no longer primarily about the dismissal of the voter-intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party. It’s about a much more important matter — namely, the sworn testimony that an Obama political appointee instructed Voting Section lawyers that no cases would be brought against any black or other minority defendants no matter how egregious their violations of the law.Moreover, that appointee, Julie Fernandes of the Civil Rights Division at the Department of Justice, is alleged to have instructed the lawyers not to enforce part of the National Voter...

Abigail Thernstrom is wrong to belittle this shocking episode. Forget about the New Black Panther Party case,” writes Abigail Thernstrom. It’s “very small potatoes.” She is suddenly upset over the “overheated rhetoric filled with insinuations and unsubstantiated charges” about the case that she grudgingly admits may “perhaps” have been a civil-rights violation. So she has explained in an NRO op-ed. Naturally, her “conservative dissent” has been seized on by the “nothing to see here” Left, which can now get back to its preferred big-potatoes-diet of Bristol Palin, Karl Rove subpoenas, and leaking classified information. It was just a year ago,...

Recent testimony before the the U.S. Civil Rights Commission from a former Justice Department lawyer has “raised serious concerns as to whether the Civil Rights Division’s enforcement policies are being pursued in a race-neutral fashion,” the panel’s chairman wrote in a letter to the head of DOJ’s Civil Rights Division Wednesday.J. Christian Adams, former trial attorney, testifies before the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. (photo by Channing Turner / Main Justice) In a letter to Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Thomas Perez, Chairman Gerald A. Reynolds highlighted several statements by former DOJ lawyer J. Christian Adams, who testified...

The commission probing allegations that the Justice Department wrongly abandoned a case against the New Black Panther Party has formally called for a federal investigation into claims that the department's Civil Rights Division will not pursue black defendants. In a letter sent Wednesday to Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez, the chairman of the bipartisan commission said testimony last week from an ex-Justice official raised "grave questions" about whether the division is "color blind" in its enforcement of the law. "This testimony raised serious concerns as to whether the Civil Rights Division's enforcement policies are being pursued in a race-neutral fashion...

The bipartisan panel investigating allegations that the Justice Department wrongly abandoned a case against the New Black Panther Party plans to issue a new round of subpoenas and call for a separate federal probe following explosive testimony from an ex-Justice official, a commissioner said. As the case heats up, members of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights may even travel to South Carolina to track down one witness.

In emotional and personal testimony, an ex-Justice official who quit over the handling of a voter intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party accused his former employer of instructing attorneys in the civil rights division to ignore cases that involve black defendants and white victims. J. Christian Adams, testifying Tuesday before the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, said that "over and over and over again," the department showed "hostility" toward those cases. He described the Black Panther case as one example of that -- he defended the legitimacy of the suit and said his "blood boiled" when he heard...

For more than a year, Attorney General Eric Holder has failed to adequately explain why his Justice Department dropped a slam-dunk voter-intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party.His department's answers to inquiries have been incomplete and unsatisfactory. Career attorneys involved in the case have not been available for questioning, even when subpoenaed.Now, one lawyer is speaking up - and making damning allegations against the Justice Department.J. Christian Adams, who was a Justice Department voting-rights lawyer until he resigned last month, is scheduled to testify before the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights on Tuesday. At issue are the events...

Complete title: EDITORIAL: Media blackout for Black Panthers--Explosive racist allegations ignored by poodles in the press Where is the New York Times? Where is The Washington Post? Where are CBS and NBC? A whistleblower makes explosive allegations about the Department of Justice; his story is backed by at least two other witnesses; and the allegations involve the two hot-button issues of race and of blatant politicization of the justice system. A potential constitutional confrontation stemming from the scandal brews between the Justice Department and the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. A congressman highly respected for thoughtfulness and bipartisanship has all...

One of the more high profile miscarriages of justice occurred in November, 2008 when members of the radical group the New Black Panthers Party gathered in front of a polling location in Philadelphia and varying truncheons and intimidated voters entering the polling booths to vote for Barack Obama (see this video ). The case was a clear cut violation of federal law. But when Barack Obama and Eric ("we are a nation of cowards" when discussing race) Holder entered office, the case was inexplicably dropped. The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights has been investigating the dismissal since then and was...

On the day President Obama was elected, armed men wearing the black berets and jackboots of the New Black Panther Party were stationed at the entrance to a polling place in Philadelphia. They brandished a weapon and intimidated voters and poll watchers. After the election, the Justice Department brought a voter-intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party and those armed thugs. I and other Justice attorneys diligently pursued the case and obtained an entry of default after the defendants ignored the charges. Before a final judgment could be entered in May 2009, our superiors ordered us to dismiss the...

The former Civil Rights Division lawyer who quit the Justice Department after he was denied permission to speak about his work on a controversial voter intimidation case will testify before the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights next month.J. Christian Adams at a Federalist Society meeting in Washington in November (Photo by Ryan J. Reilly / Main Justice). J. Christian Adams, the lead attorney on a voter intimidation case against members of the New Black Panther Party in Philadelphia, resigned from the Justice Department on June 4.Adams’ lawyer said earlier this month that his client planned to cooperate with the commission.The...

The former career Civil Rights Division lawyer who quit the Justice Department after he was denied permission to testify about his work on a controversial voter intimidation case intends to cooperate with a U.S. Commission on Civil Rights probe, Main Justice has learned.J. Christian Adams at a Federalist Society meeting in Washington in November (Photo by Ryan J. Reilly / Main Justice). But it remains unclear what information J. Christian Adams, who left the Justice Department last week, will be allowed to give in response to a commission subpoena, his lawyer acknowledged.“Absent some other resolution, Mr. Adams wants to...

(CNSNews.com) – Attorney General Eric Holder said Friday that the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division is the “conscience of our nation” and that he has restored its primacy within the department during his first year on the job.  The division, which handles "hate crimes" and voter rights cases, has come under scrutiny for failing to prosecute a group of New Black Panthers who allegedly engaged in voter intimidation and racial insults outside a Philadelphia polling station on Election Day 2008.  Holder was addressing the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC)  on Friday when he attested to the importance of the Civil Rights Division’s...