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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Thursday threatened to take the Bush administration to court if it fails to prosecute contempt citations against two White House aides. The House has held White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten and former White House Counsel Harriet Miers in contempt for their failure to appear and produce documents in the congressional investigation into the firing of several U.S. attorneys.Administration officials have indicated that they will not allow U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeffrey Taylor to prosecute the contempt citations, but Pelosi said they have no legal right to block such a prosecution. “There is no authority that permits a President to advise anyone to ignore a duly issued congressional subpoena for documents,” Pelosi said. She added that a formal assertion of executive privilege cannot be made in this case. Pelosi formally referred the House contempt citation to Taylor Thursday, saying Taylor is legally obligated to bring the case before a grand jury. In a letter to Attorney General Michael Mukasey also sent Thursday, Pelosi asked for a formal decision within one week. After that, she said the House intends to file a civil lawsuit. House Republican leaders were quick to ridicule Pelosi’s request, and used it as another opportunity to stress the importance of passing a bill updating the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. “The terrorist threat to our country is not going away, and this sort of pandering to the left-wing fever swamps of loony liberal activists does nothing to make America safer,” said Michael Steel, spokesman for House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio).
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