On March 29, Kyle Sampson, former chief of staff to AG Alberto Gonzales testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee regarding the firing of eight U.S. Attorneys. Sampson’s testimony incriminated Gonzales, who had claimed he was not involved in the firing process. Sampson finally spoke — it had been the most awaited testimony during the case that has preoccupied Washington for months. Well, now it looks like Sampson lied under oath. The former aide, as Michael Scherer reported in Salon, had trouble answering many questions that day; he tallied 127 “I don’t remembers” uttered by Sampson throughout the hearing. Perhaps Sampson should have said “I don’t remember” to this inquiry put forth by committee member Charles Schumer:
Schumer: Did you or did you not have in mind specific replacements for the dismissed U.S. Attorneys before they were asked to resign on December 7th, 2006.
Sampson: I personally did not. On December 7th, I did not have in mind any replacements for any of the seven who were asked to resign.
A January 6, 2006 email just released to the House Judiciary Committee shows that Sampson had named replacement recs for each USA on the list of to-be-fireds. Oops. This news comes during the heating up of the email controversy over the administration using RNC emails to avoid communicating through their own email system. The White House now claims to have lost 5 million of these emails, many of which relate to the firing of the eight U.S. Attorneys. It’s a pretty tangled mess — Karl Rove is back on the hot seat (I guess he’s never really off) and Plamegate is back in the news.
But the new email released revealing Sampson’s fibbing does more than just point to the fact that a former justice official lied under oath and reveal a concerted effort by the administration and the DOJ to conceal their communication, it shows that many of the potential replacements named were Bushies; that the mass purge of USAs in December was indeed a way to make room for “partisan loyalists” (an accusation the DOJ has denied). This Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee authorized subpoenas for all DOJ and White House documents relating to the firings that they say they will issue if Gonzales is not forthcoming in his testimony this Tuesday. Senate Dems say that the documents released thus far have been incomplete. I’m banking on there being more juicy bits of information buried in the DOJ and WH’s trails of paper and electronic mail. Stay tuned.
