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US Attorney General Gonzales resigns
By Matt Apuzzo
Associated Press
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WASHINGTON -- Alberto Gonzales, the nation's first Hispanic attorney general, announced his resignation Monday - ending a nasty, monthslong standoff over his honesty and competence at the helm of the Justice Department.

Republicans and Democrats alike had demanded his resignation over the botched handling of FBI terror investigations and the firings of U.S. attorneys, but President Bush had defiantly stood by his Texas friend until accepting his resignation Friday.

"It has been one of my greatest privileges to lead the Department of Justice," Gonzales said, announcing his resignation effective Sept. 17 in a terse statement. He took no questions.

Bush planned to discuss Gonzales' departure at his Crawford, Texas, ranch later Monday.;

Solicitor General Paul Clement will be acting attorney general until a replacement is found, said administration officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid pre-empting the announcement.

Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff was among those mentioned as possible successors. However, a senior administration official said the matter had not been raised with Chertoff. Bush leaves Washington next Monday for Australia, and Gonzales' replacement might not be named by then, the official said.

"Better late than never," said Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, summing up the response of many in Washington to Gonzales' resignation.

Republicans reacted cautiously.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, who offered only muted support for the attorney general when some Republicans called for Gonzales' resignation, on Monday largely blamed his troubles on Democrats.

"It is my hope that whomever President Bush selects as the next attorney general, he or she is not subjected to the same poisonous partisanship that we've sadly grown accustomed to over the past eight months," McConnell, R-Ky., said in a statement.

Gonzales, the former White House counsel who served more than two years at the Justice Department, announced his departure at the Justice Department. He reflected on his up-from-the-bootstraps life story, the son of migrant farm workers from Mexico who didn't finish elementary school.

"Even my worst days as attorney general have been better than my father's best days," Gonzales said.

Bush steadfastly - and at times angrily - refused to give in to critics, even from his own GOP, who argued that Gonzales should go. Earlier this month at a news conference, the president grew irritated when asked about accountability in his administration and turned the tables on the Democratic Congress.

"Implicit in your questions is that Al Gonzales did something wrong. I haven't seen Congress say he's done anything wrong," Bush said testily.

Gonzales, 52, called Bush on Friday to inform him of his resignation, according to a senior administration official who spoke on condition of anonymity to not pre-empt Gonzales' statement. The president had Gonzales come to lunch at his ranch on Sunday as a parting gesture.

Gonzales, whom Bush once considered for appointment to the Supreme Court, is the fourth top-ranking administration official to leave since November 2006. Donald H. Rumsfeld, an architect of the Iraq war, resigned as defense secretary one day after the November elections. Paul Wolfowitz agreed in May to step down as president of the World Bank after an ethics inquiry. And top Bush adviser Karl Rove earlier this month announced that he was stepping down.

Reacting to Monday's developments, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., said that Gonzales' department had "suffered a severe crisis of leadership that allowed our justice system to be corrupted by political influence."

Gonzales could not satisfy critics who said he had lost credibility over the Justice Department's handling of warrantless wiretaps related to the threat of terrorism and the firings of several U.S. attorneys.

As attorney general and earlier as White House counsel, Gonzales pushed for expanded presidential powers, including the eavesdropping authority. He drafted controversial rules for military war tribunals and sought to limit the legal rights of detainees at Guantanamo Bay - prompting lawsuits by civil libertarians who said the government was violating the Constitution in its pursuit of terrorists.

There were indications that the development came suddenly. Bush normally handles Cabinet resignations with efficiency, only allowing news of them to leak when a successor has been chosen and appearing with both the person departing and the replacement when the public announcement was made. That was not to be the case this time, the official said.

"Alberto Gonzales was never the right man for this job. He lacked independence, he lacked judgment, and he lacked the spine to say no to Karl Rove," said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.

"This resignation is not the end of the story. Congress must get to the bottom of this mess and follow the facts where they lead, into the White House," Reid warned.

The flap over the fired prosecutors proved to be the final straw for Gonzales, whose truthfulness in testimony to Congress was drawn into question.

Lawmakers said the dismissals of the federal prosecutors appeared to be politically motivated, and some of the fired U.S. attorneys said they felt pressured to investigate Democrats before elections. Gonzales maintained that the dismissals were based the prosecutors' lackluster performance records.

Thousands of documents released by the Justice Department show a White House plot, hatched shortly after the 2004 elections, to replace U.S. attorneys. At one point, senior White House officials, including Rove, suggested replacing all 93 prosecutors. In December 2006, eight were ordered to resign.

In several House and Senate hearings into the firings, Gonzales and other Justice Department officials failed to fully explain the ousters without contradicting each other.

During his congressional testimony, Gonzales answered "I don't know" and "I can't recall" scores of times and even some Republicans said his testimony was evasive. Bush, however, praised Gonzales' performance and said the attorney general was "honest" and "honorable."

U.S. attorneys serve at the pleasure of the president, and can be removed. But congressional Democrats said politics played an unusually critical role in the ouster of several prosecutors.

In 2004, Gonzales pressed to reauthorize a secret domestic spying program over the Justice Department's protests. Gonzales was White House counsel at the time and during a dramatic hospital confrontation he and then-White House chief of staff Andrew Card sought approval from then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, who was in intensive care. Ashcroft refused.

The White House subsequently reauthorized the program without the department's approval. Later, Bush ordered changes to the program to help the department defend its legality. The domestic surveillance program was later declared unconstitutional by a federal judge and since has been changed to require court approval before surveillance can be conducted.

Similarly, Gonzales found himself on the defensive in early March for FBI's improper and, in some cases, illegal prying into Americans' personal information during terror and spy probes. On March 9, the Justice Department's inspector general released an audit showing that FBI agents, over a three-year period, demanded telephone and Internet companies to hand over their customers' personal information without official authorization.

The damning audit also found that the FBI had improperly obtained telephone records in non-emergency circumstances, and concluded that it underreported to Congress how often it used national security letters to ask businesses to turn over customer data. The letters are administrative subpoenas that do not require a judge's approval.

Gonzales declared himself upset and frustrated over the findings. But lawmakers said they had begun to lose confidence in him.

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Reader comments on this story - 34 total

Note: All views and opinions expressed in reader comments are solely those of the individual submitting the comment, and not those of the Pantagraph or its staff.

Now~~ wrote on Aug 28, 2007 4:50 AM:

" If we could only get Blo-go, Bush, Cheney, and a few more to resign we might have a new beginning. Everybody together now, quit,quit,quit, go home. "

Sin wrote on Aug 27, 2007 8:36 PM:

" May God have mercy on all of your blogging souls-and never let Mike Vick pet your dog. "

Reader wrote on Aug 27, 2007 8:22 PM:

" Well said "Stop it". "

re:umm proud wrote on Aug 27, 2007 7:48 PM:

" so i missed the "s" who proof reads. tons of posters do the same. doesn't detract from the point "

bring back reno wrote on Aug 27, 2007 6:44 PM:

" we need more constitutionally mandated incineration of women and babies......this firing attorney's thing will be the end of our democracy if it continues..... "

Uh wrote on Aug 27, 2007 6:12 PM:

" So what will the liberals complain about now? Conyers might actually have to work, maybe Schumer too. As for those stating Gonzalez is guilty, (like always, T is an idiot), the man was never proven to do anything illegal. If libs have to focus on issues and not people, they choke like the Buffalo Bills. (For the uneducated, they lost multiple super bowls in a row). "

Stop It wrote on Aug 27, 2007 6:07 PM:

" We have many serious problems in this country, none of which will be solved by name calling, or by thinking only in terms of liberals and conservatives, democrats and republicans, red states and blue states. We can't rescue our citizens from natural disasters, our bridges are crumbling, we have millions of uninsured, a debt of trillions of dollars, and climbing drop-out and illiteracy rates. Please contact your representatives and ask that they work with all who are committed to solutions, no matter what party. "

umm proud dem wrote on Aug 27, 2007 4:30 PM:

" you are wat make America great 2! Grammar....so easy a caveman can do it. "

VERY PROUD DEM. wrote on Aug 27, 2007 3:50 PM:

" i'm proud to be a Democrat. that's what make America great. If Bush is the best the republicans can put forth i don't understand why there are any republicans at all. "

So wrote on Aug 27, 2007 3:23 PM:

" If you fire ALL the U.S Attorneys at the beginning of your term for political purposes that is ok. If you do so in the middle of the term that is wrong. "

The Irascible Fachna wrote on Aug 27, 2007 2:55 PM:

" Will liberals and Democrats NEVER stop beating their wives? "

hey lester wrote on Aug 27, 2007 2:04 PM:

" I think you shoud back up from the bar and put down your home rolled. Your mine needs to clear out so you can think straight. "

? wrote on Aug 27, 2007 2:01 PM:

" Did his Green Card run out? "

yo wrote on Aug 27, 2007 2:00 PM:

" I always thought that when you screwed up a job in government they promoted you so you could not do it again. "

Yep wrote on Aug 27, 2007 1:57 PM:

" One more rat jumping ship. Rove, now Gonzales! August has been a GREAT month. "

you should all be in Congress wrote on Aug 27, 2007 1:44 PM:

" you get as much accomplished with your partisan ship as they do, except the politicians do it all on OUR time while you all do it on your employers dime. Gonzales was a disgrace and should have gone a long time ago, and before the other side of the aisle gets too smug...you brought us Blagojevich didn't you. "

Alphonse wrote on Aug 27, 2007 1:41 PM:

" This is good news, and long overdue. Lester and Cynic, this article does not elaborate on just how much Republican opposition there was to Gonzales' leadership. This is no liberal conspiracy based on name calling and scape goating, and I don't take any childish delight in his downfall. It was just plain and simple to see that this man is incompetant and corrupt. It is clear that he supported the decision to fire talented US attorneys simply because they were not "loyal bushies" (quoted from a white house memo.) These attorneys did not exclusively hound democrats, and so they were let go. That's diabolical, manipulative, and grounds for dismissal. "

Budweiser: Clydesdale wrote on Aug 27, 2007 1:37 PM:

" Mr. T: Thank you for the free advertising. "

Dear T wrote on Aug 27, 2007 1:36 PM:

" This guy was guilty? Show me the facts! You have none! "

To wc wrote on Aug 27, 2007 1:21 PM:

" I didn't like Rove either, he frightens me quite frankly, but don't think he simply resigned to jump out of a sinking ship. Quite the opposite. Bush is almost done and the GOP needs Rove to start focusing on next year's elections. They're placing him more strategically to carry on this quagmire; not losing him to the college lecture circuit. "

Old saying wrote on Aug 27, 2007 12:56 PM:

" Like rats from a sinking ship... "

YES! FINALLY! Now wrote on Aug 27, 2007 12:55 PM:

" we have only TWO MORE TO GET OUT - Bush and Cheney. I'm sure that won't happen, but I can hope. I listened to all of the hearings and all of Gonzie's "I can't recall" and "I don't know". My consensus on all of his statement containing those words is that he is not competent to do his job if he apparently has a memory disorder and apparently knows nothing that goes on in his own department. INCOMPETENT is not even a strong enough word for him. "

T wrote on Aug 27, 2007 12:39 PM:

" You Bush lovers make me laugh. You blame the liberals for all this. Show me the facts. You have none. The Bush administration is pretty close to the titanic. Just a sinking ship and nobody to blame but themselves. Get over yourselves. This guy was guilty. "

lester, lester, lester wrote on Aug 27, 2007 12:28 PM:

" Dear lester, i regret to inform you that as a man who considers himself in the middle of these two parties, you have said by far the dumbest thing i have ever heard. What am i supposed to say now, Rublicant's form a decent budget, Rublicant's win a war and should have know better? No i would have to be five or an idiot. Since we dont have all the facts into the resignation, lets let the name calling stay with 3rd graders. Am i happy that he is gone, you bet! With disrespect and abhorrence, Mark "

Cynic wrote on Aug 27, 2007 12:28 PM:

" And so they start. Let us crow and take great delight in slandering another. Let all the liberal rejoice and ignore the facts. But the fact is that if Gonzales was a liberal the media would not dare touch him no matter what he did. Now all you liberals get together and give him a few more kicks as he walks out the door. While at the same time you tell people how you keep an open mind. And do not judge to quickly. "

JTE wrote on Aug 27, 2007 12:22 PM:

" ... a good man who served his country? How? Given the overtly political appearance of the discharge of attorneys, and his utter inability to address the issues, the only service he seems to have given his country would possibly be "scapegoat". "

Best Wishs US Attorney General Gonzales wrote on Aug 27, 2007 12:05 PM:

" Maybe you can help harvest some grapes for the Pelosi family vineyards. While Nancy screams pro union pro union! "

lester wrote on Aug 27, 2007 11:51 AM:

" Are you librals happy now? sure, I bet your real happy now that you have run down a good man who served his county. why do dum-o-crats hate America is what I want to know "

J O wrote on Aug 27, 2007 11:44 AM:

" Something big will happen after Labor Day. Perhaps an attack on Iran. Perhaps a staged act of terror. Perhaps a national housing crisis unmatched by any in U.S. history. The chess pieces are being shifted about. The secret executive orders have already been signed. The players are almost set in position. What could it be? "

DT wrote on Aug 27, 2007 11:40 AM:

" Gonzales should have resigned due to his ineffectiveness as the AG. It should not have been as the result of a Congressional witch hunt into legitimate actions within the authority of another branch of the government. "

wc wrote on Aug 27, 2007 11:08 AM:

" first rove now gonzales. rats are the first thing off of a sinking ship "

OH BABY wrote on Aug 27, 2007 10:37 AM:

" The floor is crumbling under their feet! "

Good wrote on Aug 27, 2007 10:37 AM:

" Better late than never. This man was known as an empty suit and crony in the "Brownie" tradition. "

ML wrote on Aug 27, 2007 10:35 AM:

" During his congressional testimony, Gonzales answered "I don't know" and "I can't recall" scores of times and even some Republicans said his testimony was evasive. It worked for Hillery. Bush, however, praised Gonzales' performance and said the attorney general was "honest" and "honorable." What else could he do? Deny, deny, deny. "
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