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Miers weighed Yang’s firing according to Sen. Feinstein |
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By Susan Crabtree
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Posted: 04/23/07 09:24 PM [ET] |
Former White House Counsel Harriet Miers discussed firing ex-U.S. Attorney Debra Yang, who was leading an investigation into lucrative ties between Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-Calif.) and a lobbying firm before she left her government post voluntarily last fall, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) charged in a hearing last week.
Feinstein has repeatedly questioned the circumstances surrounding Yang’s departure, but until last week she provided no reasons for her suspicions. Last Thursday, however, during the questioning of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales late in a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Feinstein flatly stated that Miers had discussed “whether to remove Debra Yang from Los Angeles.”
A Feinstein spokesman indicated only that the senator had learned that Miers had considered ousting Yang “through interviews” and did not respond to repeated questions to elaborate. Andrew Koneschusky, a spokesman to Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), who is leading the probe, also did not respond to questions about whether Miers had targeted Yang and any evidence Feinstein may have about it.
Yang resigned last October, months before Democrats began reviewing the Justice Department’s decision to fire eight other federal prosecutors. According to a report in the American Lawyer, she was lured away by a $1.5 million-plus offer to become a partner at Gibson, Dunn and Crutcher LLP, which is defending Lewis in the probe.
Yang will co-chair the firm’s crisis-management practice group, along with Theodore B. Olson, the former solicitor general of the Bush administration who is now at the firm’s D.C. office. Former Assistant U.S. Attorney Douglas Fuchs, Yang’s colleague at the Los Angeles U.S. attorney’s office, also has joined her at Gibson, Dunn and Crutcher. Yang and Fuchs have recused themselves from working on Lewis’s defense.
Fuchs did not respond to The Hill’s queries. Yang responded by e-mail yesterday but gave no details, saying only she had been busy with work and had not followed Feinstein’s comments about Miers.
In an interview with The Hill last month, Yang dismissed questions about the timing of her departure, which occurred about a month before seven other U.S. attorneys were fired late last year. She argued that she left for personal reasons based on financial concerns and the fact that she is a single mother. She said it had nothing to do with the firings of other U.S. federal prosecutors.
While Feinstein has repeatedly questioned the motive behind Yang’s decision to leave the U.S. attorney job, she provided no reasons for her suspicion before the hearing.
“I have questions about Debra Yang’s departure and I can’t answer those questions right at this time,” Feinstein told reporters on March 20. “Was she asked to resign, and if so, why? We have to ferret that out.”
Feinstein also contends that former San Diego U.S. Attorney Carol Lam’s firing is connected to her role in the investigation of former GOP Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham (Calif.), who is in jail for accepting bribes in return for contracts. The Lewis probe is related to the Cunningham probe, which has recently ballooned to include the former third-highest ranking official at the CIA as well as a San Diego businessman.
The Justice Department has denied any relationship between Lam’s firing and the Cunningham investigation.
In her previous comments to The Hill, Yang argued that her departure would not affect the case against Lewis in any way, noting that the Justice Department said it would have allowed her to stay in the position “as long as I wanted to.”
“The investigation [into Lewis] would never be delayed or affected in any way because of my departure,” she said. “We had 260 attorneys in that office.”
She said she had been looking for a more lucrative position in the private sector for months. She added that a longtime friend in the Orange County office of Gibson, Dunn and Crutcher, Nick Hanna, was the one who first contacted her about the position, not Olson or anyone else with close ties to the Bush administration. She also said she turned down a more lucrative offer from another firm.
Meanwhile, Schumer ridiculed the White House’s latest words of support for Gonzales.
“I heard what the president had to say this morning,” Schumer told reporters on a conference call yesterday.
“Unfortunately, it’s just like Iraq because both with the Justice Department and Iraq, only the president and a small band of advisers don’t believe we need a change in course.”
Schumer said Democrats are still trying to figure out who was at the center of the plan to fire eight U.S. attorneys. He said they plan to review the Gonzales transcript from last Thursday and compare that with testimony and interviews from other Department of Justice staff and explore any inconsistencies. He also said Democrats plan to question Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty and Assistant Attorney General William Moschella, most likely on Friday.
“When you go over the attorney general’s testimony … the arrow points more and more to the White House … in regards to who put together the list,” he said.
Schumer also said the committee wanted to know more about the dismissal of former U.S. Attorney Paul Charlton, who was investigating Rep. Rick Renzi (R-Ariz.) before being fired in December. Renzi stepped down from the House intelligence panel last week after the FBI searched a business owned by his wife.
Schumer said Senate Democrats also continue to try to work out an agreement with former Justice aide Monica Goodling to testify and with the administration to gain testimony from White House staffers. If the Bush administration continues to refuse a written transcript of the testimony, Schumer added, Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) will be forced to issue subpoenas. |
