Word: comey
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...ethical cloud stems from the visit then White House Counsel Gonzales paid then Attorney General John Ashcroft back in March 2004, as former Deputy Attorney General James Comey testified to Congress earlier this week. President Bush needed the Attorney General's signature to reauthorize the administration's classified domestic wiretapping program. Trouble is, Ashcroft was in the hospital suffering from acute pancreatitis, and Acting Attorney General Comey refused to sign, because he didn't think the program was legal. So someone, quite possibly Bush, sent Gonzales and chief of staff Andrew Card rushing to Ashcroft's bedside in search...
...could argue that all Gonzales did was zealously represent his client, the President. Gonzales apparently disagreed with Comey on the legality of the program, and he was just pressing his case to Ashcroft, albeit in a rather unseemly way. " The ethics rules let lawyers question each other's decisions," says Professor Nancy Rapoport, an ethics expert at the University of Houston law school. "It's just a little icky when you do it to someone who's in the hospital. But I don't think it rises to the level of anything that's actionable. I think it just fails...
While Ashcroft may have been in no shape to sign an important document, Comey got to him first, and Ashcroft deferred to him, "so at worst it would be attempted misconduct," explains the University of Texas law school's Charles Silver...
Gillers also believes that Gonzales tried to deceive Ashcroft, because, according to Comey's testimony, he did not make it "crystal clear" that Ashcroft was being asked to sign off on a program that the Justice Department had already found to be illegal. The Texas disciplinary rules prohibit lawyers from engaging in "conduct involving...deceit." There's plenty of room to argue whether the eavesdropping program is, in fact, legal, or whether Gonzales at least believed at the time that that it was legal. But let's assume Gillers is correct. Now what...
...Whatever was discussed in that hospital room, one thing is clear - Comey's disclosure of that emergency visit to Ashcroft has further weakened Gonzales' already weak support on Capitol Hill. In the last couple of days, Republican Senator Chuck Hagel has joined the call for the Attorney General's resignation. And Thursday Senators Charles Schumer of New York and Diane Feinstein of California announced they intend to introduce a no-confidence motion against Gonzales in the Senate. Senate majority leader Harry Reid supports the motion and his staff say it could come to the floor as soon as next week...