WASHINGTON — White House political advisor Karl Rove more than two years ago began seeking input from the Department of Justice into how many U.S. attorneys should be fired in the second Bush administration, according to e-mails released Thursday that show a deeper White House involvement in the dismissal of federal prosecutors last year.
The e-mails also show that the Justice Department was willing to defer to Rove on the matter.
According to the e-mails, Rove in January 2005 asked the White House counsel's office about its plans for the nation's federal prosecutors, and whether it would fire some or all of them.
Three days later, D. Kyle Sampson, a Justice official and soon-to-be deputy chief of staff to Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales -- who was then the White House counsel -- responded with a point-by-point strategy on how the administration might proceed.
As an operational matter, Sampson wrote, "we would like to replace 15% to 20%" of the 93 U.S. attorneys, those they considered to be underperforming. The others, Sampson said, "are doing a great job, are loyal Bushies."
But as a political matter, he cautioned that "when push comes to shove," home-state senators who supported their prosecutors likely would resist the firings. Nevertheless, Sampson said, "if Karl thinks there would be political will to do it, so do I."
The administration eventually fired eight U.S. attorneys, at first saying they were let go for job performance reasons. But new details surfacing in a Democratic-led Capitol Hill investigation are suggesting that politics may have been the prime motive for jettisoning the prosecutors. The administration denies that.
White House officials have said that former White House Counsel Harriet E. Miers initially floated the idea of firing all the prosecutors. But they said her idea was scrapped by Gonzales and others who thought it impractical. The e-mails released Thursday suggest that Rove had also brought up the idea of getting the resignations of all 93.
On Thursday, the White House denied that Rove had hatched the plot to fire all of them, with White House spokeswoman Dana Perino saying the latest e-mail exchange "does not contradict nor is it inconsistent with what we have said."
Miers was named to succeed Gonzales as counsel to the president in November 2004. "During that time, and until she takes over on Feb. 3, 2005, when the attorney general was confirmed, she would have been thinking about transition issues," Perino said.
