E-mails detail goals in firing U.S. attorneys

WASHINGTON — Just weeks after President Bush was inaugurated for a second term in January 2005, his White House and the Justice Department had pretty much settled on a plan to "push out" some of the nation's 93 U.S. attorneys.

But which ones?

D. Kyle Sampson, chief of staff to Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales, came up with a checklist. He rated each of the prosecutors with criteria that appeared to value political allegiance as much as job performance.

He recommended retaining "strong U.S. attorneys who have ... exhibited loyalty to the president and attorney general." He suggested "removing weak U.S. attorneys who have ... chafed against administration initiatives."

Those words are enshrined in some 150 pages of e-mails and other documents the White House turned over Tuesday to the Senate and House Judiciary committees. The panels are looking into allegations that the firings were motivated by political reasons rather than the prosecutors' performance, as the Justice Department has said.

The documents offer an extraordinary look at political tactics within the Bush administration, and show the White House working closely with the Justice Department to justify the firings. The administration even adopted contingency plans for how to "quiet" anyone who complained. And it was the administration that gave the final go-ahead to fire eight prosecutors, all of them Bush appointees.

The documents show that in one case, officials were eager to free up the prosecutor's slot in Little Rock, Ark., so it could be filled by Timothy Griffin, a GOP operative close to White House political advisor Karl Rove, at all costs.

"We should gum this to death," Sampson e-mailed Monica Goodling, the Justice Department's liaison to the White House. He said officials should talk up Griffin's appointment and try to "forestall" any criticism from Capitol Hill. Just "run out the clock" on any objections, he said.

Elsewhere, the documents describe the office of Sen. Pete V. Domenici (R-N.M.), who was pushing for the removal of the prosecutor in Albuquerque, as "happy as a clam" that David C. Iglesias was fired.

But the material also noted that Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.) was "very unhappy" about the ouster of U.S. Atty. Daniel G. Bogden of Las Vegas and "didn't understand the urgency."