Posted on 09/05/2001 1:23:51 PM PDT by jern
By JOHN SOLOMON, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush is prepared to invoke executive privilege if Congress demands to see documents about prosecutors' decisions in three Clinton-era cases, administration officials said Wednesday.
The claim, if made, would be Bush's first known use of executive privilege, a doctrine recognized by the courts to ensure presidents can get candid advice in private without fear of it becoming public.
White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales recommended that Bush make the privilege claim if a Republican-led House committee subpoenas the memos or seeks to question Attorney General John Ashcroft about them, the officials told The Associated Press.
The House Government Reform Committee prepared subpoenas demanding the disputed documents and planned to serve Ashcroft on Thursday, setting up a possible legal showdown.
The officials said the administration has researched at least four other instances in which executive privilege was cited involving similar documents.
Executive privilege is best known for the unsuccessful attempts by former Presidents Nixon and Clinton to keep evidence secret in impeachment investigations.
Rep. Dan Burton (news - bio - voting record), R-Ind., the chairman of the House committee, said the Bush administration's stance threatened Congress' ability to oversee the executive branch.
``While I have a great deal of respect for the attorney general, he has announced a new policy that broadens executive privilege,'' Burton said. ``If this unprecedented policy is permitted to stand, Congress will not be able to exercise meaningful oversight of the executive branch.''
Burton's committee has for months been seeking Justice Department (news - web sites) memos about prosecutors' decisions in cases involving Democratic fund raising, a former Clinton White House official and a former federal drug enforcement agent.
A senior administration official said while the decisions were made during Clinton's presidency, Bush had accepted Gonzales' recommendation and was prepared to invoke the privilege and create a clear policy that prosecutors' discussions should be off-limits from congressional scrutiny.
White House lawyers and the president concluded ``the fair administration of justice requires full and complete deliberations and that most often can best be accomplished when prosecutors think through their options in private,'' the official said, speaking only on condition of anonymity.
The claim would be the latest in a string of efforts by the new administration to restrain the flow of information to Congress about private deliberations.
Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites) has rebuffed requests by the General Accounting Office (news - web sites) and a Democratic congressman to divulge information about people he met with and how he helped develop Bush's energy policy.
And a Senate committee chaired by Sen. Joseph Lieberman (news - bio - voting record) was initially turned down when it demanded several documents detailing the administration's decision to review regulations enacted by Clinton. Eventually, the administration allowed the committee to review the memos, but an aide to Lieberman said officials sent a clear message they would assert their right to withhold documents.
Ashcroft indicated last week the administration intended to reverse the practice of sharing prosecutors' deliberative documents with congressional committees.
Several such memos were shared with Congress during both Republican and Democratic administrations. Most recently in the 1990s such documents were turned over to the Whitewater, fund-raising, pardons and impeachment investigations.
But the concept of extending executive privilege to Justice Department decisions isn't new. During the Reagan years, executive privilege was cited as the reason the department did not tell Congress about some memos in a high-profile environmental case.
And then-Attorney General Janet Reno (news - web sites) advised Clinton in 1999 that he could invoke the privilege to keep from disclosing documents detailing department views on 16 pardon cases.
Legal experts are split on how such a claim might fare in a court challenge.
``Prosecution is a core executive function and from that starting point, a claim of executive privilege is quite a good one,'' said John Barrett, a former Iran-Contra prosecutor who now teaches law at St. John's University.
But Noah Feldman, a constitutional law professor at New York University, said courts would have to balance the president's right to confidential advice against Congress' right to oversight. Feldman said the fact that several prosecutorial decision-making memos have been disclosed to Congress in the past without apparent harm to the presidency could influence the debate.
Clinton's former chief of staff, John Podesta, said most new administrations test the limits of congressional oversight then conclude it is better to reach a negotiated settlement.
``Ultimately the public loses faith in fair administration of justice from over-claims of executive privilege, especially in matters that don't have to do with direct advice to the president,'' Podesta said. ``It appears to me that every administration has to learn that the hard way.''
To h with this compassionate conservatism clap. SOS
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Well said.
Once again, You have proven the obvious…you don’t know shit from shinola. If you wish to perpetuate your status as an apologist for the gov’t, you should come up with a better rationalization than that.
So, in his own letter disputing the withold of the declinations in question he gave Ashcroft the tool for him to use if he wanted it witheld.
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THAT would be W's MO!!!
How can the Dems complain when the Administration says No to Republicans in order to not rehash the Clinton sh!t all over again?
I was somewhat nervous about W, but he plays poker like a pro.
Conrad Memorandum (Clinton Campaign Task Force Chief Robert Conrad declination originally subpeonaed last year on August 24, 2000)
Two Declination findings:(1)investigation of former DEA Special Agent in Charge Ernest Howard, and (2) investigation(s) of Clinton White House aide Mark Midddleton.
Burton's main gripe in his letter leading up to his subpeona for Ashcroft on the 13th was the failure to reach just such an accomodation, which he expected to recieve. Why did Ashcroft trump Burton and get the ExPriv declaration for the items I note in #128 and 132? We shall see.
Not quite.
I doubt Gore would have met with President "open the damn border now" Fox five (5) times already.
Jorge is a freaking joke...
How do you pronounce that?
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