Political Prosecution Links

Selective Prosecution: Majority Staff Report and Additional Letters

- Majority Staff Report on Allegations of Selective Prosecution and Additional Documents (April 17, 2008) - US Atty Biskupic's political persecution of the innocent Georgia Thompson, pp 19-23 -

- Letter to Justice Department OIG/OPR (April 17, 2008)

- Letter to Karl Rove (April 17, 2008)

- Letter to AG Mukasey (April 17, 2008)

House Judiciary Committee Demands Action on Political Prosecutions

via MAL Contends

The House Judiciary Committee is proceeding in investigating the Bush administration's political prosecutions.

Press Release from April 17

(Washington, DC) - Today, House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI) and Committee Members Linda Sánchez (D-CA), Artur Davis (D-AL), and Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) announced three critical actions in the Committee's investigation into allegations of selective or poltiically-motivated prosecution in the Justice Department.

The Members today invited Karl Rove to testify before the committee; urged the Justice Department's Office of the Inspector General and Office of Professional Responsibility to investigate those allegations; and demanded that Attorney General Michael Mukasey provide additional documents on this subject.

Today's actions result from the Committee's majority staff report, also released today, which details the cases, interviews and documents they have reviewed since the Committee began its investigation last year.

"There continue to be numerous complaints of selective or politically motivated prosecution since our investigation began last year," Conyers said. "The actions we are taking today, including calling Karl Rove to testify, are an effort to get to the bottom of this matter."

Today's announcement stems from the Committee's 2007 oversight hearing on selective prosecution, during which testimony was heard and documents were entered into the record regarding cases from Alabama, Mississippi, Wisconsin, Georgia, and Pennsylvania.

Since the hearing, majority committee staff has continued its investigation with interviews and document collection about additional cases across the country.

"While this report is extensive and significant progress has been made in our investigation, many facts remain unknown," Conyers said. "The Justice Department has simply not been forthcoming and I feel the only way to move this investigation forward is to seek further independent investigation and testimony from Karl Rove, who appears to be the missing link in a chain from the White House to the Justice Department."

The letters and the majority staff report are available below:

Selective Prosecution: Majority Staff Report and Additional Letters

- Majority Staff Report on Allegations of Selective Prosecution and Additional Documents (April 17, 2008) - US Atty Biskupic's political persecution of the innocent Georgia Thompson, pp 19-23 -

- Letter to Justice Department OIG/OPR (April 17, 2008)

- Letter to Karl Rove (April 17, 2008)

- Letter to AG Mukasey (April 17, 2008)

House Comm. Slams US Atty Biskupic in DoJ Prosecutions Letter

U.S. House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr., D-Mich. has requested from U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales documents and information concerning the prosecution of former democratic Gov. Don Siegelman (pictured at right) in a letter released yesterday.

Siegelman is widely believed to be a victim of a Karl Rove-engineered prosecution.

The letter was signed by four members of the House Committee on the Judiciary, including Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI).

The letter slams and asks for information about three a total of three prosecutions, including the infamous Georgia Thompson prosecution.

The letter reads in part:

In order to assure the public that everyone, no matter their political affiliation, is treated equally under the law, we are initially requesting documents relating to the Department's handling of three cases, and in particular any memoranda, analysis, or other communications discussing whether and to what extent criminal charges should be and were pursued against the individuals listed below.

On April 5, 2007, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, citing "evidence [that] is beyond thin," threw out the federal conviction of Georgia Thompson, a Wisconsin state procurement officer. The office of the U.S. Attorney in Wisconsin, Steven Biskupic, had won a jury conviction of Ms. Thompson, claiming the career civil servant impermissibly awarded a contract to a travel agency whose director was a political contributor to Democratic Governor Jim Doyle. The U.S. Attorney proceeded with the prosecution even though the travel agency that won the contract submitted the lowest bid, and tied for first place on the complicated merit score that ranked all contract bidders. Additionally, there was no evidence that Ms. Thompson was aware of or interested in the political contributions by the head of the travel agency.

Steven Biskupic's name appeared on a March, 2005, list that was compiled by Department of Justice staff which named U.S. Attorneys who could potentially be ousted. In January, 2006, Mr. Biskupic indicted Ms. Thompson; that same month, Mr. Biskupic's name had been removed from the DOJ list of U.S. Attorneys who might be replaced. After Ms. Thompson's conviction in June, 2006, the campaign of Gov. Doyle's Republican opponent, U.S. Representative Mark Green, seized on the conviction as a means to paint Gov. Doyle as corrupt. The Court of Appeals, finding that no crime had been committed, acquitted Ms. Thompson, declaring her "innocent," but of course, the political damage had been done and could not be rectified.

On April 10, 2007, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy and several other senators requested documents regarding the Georgia Thompson case, including documents regarding contacts between White House personnel, Main Justice, or outside parties and the United States Attorney's office handling the prosecution. Our Committee joined that request the following day. On May 17, 2007, Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Richard Hertling responded by producing some documents relevant to other requests made in that letter, but did not produce any documents regarding the Thompson case. Mr. Hertling explained that "processing [the Thompson] documents would require an extensive commitment of resources and time." Mr. Hertling's letter further noted that the Department was in the process of searching for evidence of communications between Main Justice and the local U.S. Attorney's office, and that he expected 'that there were [such] communications during the investigation and prosecution of the case." Finally, Mr. Hertling's letter explained that the search for relevant communications regarding the Thompson case continued in "the Criminal Division, the Office of the Attorney General, and the Office of the Deputy Attorney General." The two months that have passed since Mr. Hertling's letter have not assuaged our concerns regarding the Thompson prosecution, and we are renewing our request that the documents related to that matter be promptly produced as well as the other documents requested in this letter.

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Bama’ Rep Blasts DoJ, Singles out Biskupic

U.S. Rep. Artur Davis (D-AL) has had enough of the politicized prosecutions of the Bush/Rove Department of Justice.

Davis, a three-term congressman and member of the House Committee on the Judiciary, has taken up the cause of former Alabama governor Don Siegelman (D), roundly criticizing the DoJ prosecutions of him (one prosecution was dismissed) and calling for a Congressional investigation.

The bizarre conviction of Siegelman this year is drawing nationwide condemnation as a political prosecution engineered by Karl Rove, similar to the prosecution of the innocent Wisconsin state worker Georgia Thompson, now exonerated.

In his letter to the chair of the House Committee on the Judiciary, Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), released last Thursday, Rep Davis commended the hearing that Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), is reportedly intent on holding on the Siegelman matter.

“A variety of claims have arisen regarding the Siegelman case. It has been suggested that the case against Siegelman was unusually weak and uncorroborated. … Most explosively, an attorney who worked in the 2002 campaign against Siegelman has sworn an affidavit claiming that she participated in a November 2002 conference call in which an influential Republican claimed that Karl Rove had given assurances that Siegelman would be indicted. Prior to his service in the White House, Rove had an extensive history of involvement in Alabama elections, and maintains contact with a number of Republican contributors and operatives in my state,” wrote Davis.

In his letter, Davis also singled out Wisconsin U.S. Attorney Steven Biskupic (Eastern District of Wisconsin) for his prosecution of the innocent Georgia Thompson—used unsuccessfully by Republican political operatives to tarnish Democratic Governor Jim Doyle in the 2006 election and described by an appeals court as “preposterous”—as an example of the politically motivated prosecutions of the U.S. DoJ under Bush and Rove.

“At least one U.S. Attorney, Steven M. Biskupic, was removed from a list of prosecutors to be terminated only after he indicted a Democratic appointee in the midst of a closely contested governor’s race in Wisconsin,” wrote Davis.

The DoJ prosecution of Siegelman was recently blasted in a New York Times editorial (June 30) as a Karl Rove-engineered political attack:

“The most arresting evidence that Mr. Siegelman may have been railroaded is a sworn statement by a Republican lawyer, Dana Jill Simpson. Ms. Simpson said she was on a conference call in which Bill Canary, the husband of the United States attorney whose office handled the case, insisted that ‘his girls’ would ‘take care of” Mr. Siegelman. According to Ms. Simpson, he identified his ‘girls’ as his wife, Leura Canary, and another top Alabama prosecutor. Mr. Canary, who has longstanding ties to Karl Rove, also said, according to Ms. Simpson, that he had worked it out with ’Karl.’”

Though the House Committee chaired by Conyers has already held several hearings on the DoJ, observers believe that Conyers will continue his dogged oversight up until the end of the Bush administration.
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