Posted on 02/16/2007 1:32:35 PM PST by truth49
Was the 2004 election the downfall of United States Attorney John McKay? This is Jonathan Bechtle for the Evergreen Freedom Foundation.
John McKay, the U.S. Attorney for Western Washington, was recently fired by the Justice Department without explanation, leading to much speculation over what he did wrong. Official sources cited performance-related reasons. We agree. McKay deserved to be fired over his performance in mishandling election crime investigations since 2004.
Prior to the general election that year, McKay issued several press releases saying that election crime complaints would be dealt with promptly and aggressively.
The Evergreen Freedom Foundation and others took him at his word, sending him information on the many irregularities that started to surface during the recountevidence of possible federal crimes like double-voting, felon voting, illegal registrations, and more ballots than voters.
McKay ignored this evidence, however, stating that none of the alleged crimes were under his jurisdiction, despite the fact that at that same time, four other U.S. attorneys in places like Milwaukee were conducting investigations into exactly the same type of crimes.
In April 2004, during the height of the election investigation, McKays office even told an Olympian reporter that they were not taking any calls on the election.
In May 2005 the Evergreen Freedom Foundation filed a complaint with the U.S. Attorney Generals office over John McKays refusal to act on the evidence of voter fraud that had been given to him. We were informed that the department was investigating McKays actions, but because of federal privacy policies, we were not told the outcome.
Did our complaint play a part in McKays firing? Its hard to say.
But we do know that a necessary element of any secure election system is swift investigation of election crimes. The U.S. Attorney is an essential part of this enforcement, and John McKay failed to do his part.
This is Jonathan Bechtle for the Evergreen Freedom Foundation.
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Well, if this is why he was fired, it looks as if Gonzalez finally did something right.
McKay participated in the same old govt employee practice "pass the buck" instead of "the buck stops here" mentality.
In that case, it probably wasn't the reason.
Appointed in Oct. 2001 by President Bush.
Sounds like he lacked the testicles to go after the Democrat machine that controls most of Washington's politics.
Good deal! One down...
If the reason really was that he lacked the courage to go after Democrat corruption, then good riddance to a yellow striped punk.
I wonder what the democrat party was blackmailing him with for him not to do his job ...............I mean all republicans have spines of steel...........right
You mean Johnny Sutton and this clown were both appointed by Bush?
Huh, go figure. Must be coincidence.
There were several factors in this firing but I am pretty sure the overall performance of the office was the main reason.
They did not prosecute enough cases during his tenure.
Yep, we're not supposed to believe the cold hard facts. Bush is either so far up in his ivory tower and ignorant of what has been going on with Johnny Sutton and his framing prosecution of the border agents, or he's in on the con.
There isn't any gray area here, and I'm sick of the stalling on a pardon for both of these brave AMERICAN BORDER AGENTS.
There's a reason they're political appointees...
There's a greater political element to fed prosecution than most people would either believe or want to know. And it has very little to do with justice.
If Republicans would stand up more for what is right, versus what is popular, we would all be better off.
Wow, I knew that someone would uncover the reason that McKay was fired and the reason that so many of the vile Democrats were complaining about it. Feinstein is making threats of changing the appointing process back to some obsolete rule that if Bush doesn't get a replacement approved in 122 days, the judiciary committee gets to make the appointment.
Strike that. Conservatism hasn't changed, it was simple hijacked.
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