Marcie Wheeler [AKA emptywheel] went on a weekend vacation. I don’t even know her, but I missed her. She’s the one, along with Josh Marshall, that keeps us all informed. Here’s a post of hers I would have hated to miss:
In my rush to leave town on Thursday, I missed this letter Pat Leahy sent to Brad Schlozman about his missing homework:
According to news reports, you have confirmed that you resigned last week from the Department of Justice. Yet, the Judiciary Committee is still waiting for your responses to written questions from Committee Members following your June 5 testimony at the Committee’s hearing on "Preserving Prosecutorial Independence: Is the Department of Justice Politicizing the Hiring and Firing of U.S. Attorneys?-Part V." These responses were due June 28, nearly two months ago.
In addition, during your appearance before the Committee, you testified about your preparation for the hearing, the unprecedented U.S. attorney replacements, the use of partisan considerations in career hiring, and your role as the interim U.S, Attorney and while at the Civil Rights Division in pressing certain cases in connection with recent elections. Your answers to questions made clear the importance of certain emails and other documents the Committee has still not received from the Department of Justice.
Your answers and these documents are especially important after you appeared to mislead the Committee and the public about your decision to file an election eve lawsuit in direct conflict with longstanding Justice Department policy. Despite testifying at least nine times at the hearing that you were directed to file this suit by the Public Integrity section, you sent a letter a week after the hearing that you were not, in fact, directed to do so, I asked you repeatedly about this case at the hearing because of concerns that it was done to use law enforcement power improperly to affect the outcome of the election, which is the reason the Department instituted the policy as a safeguard against such manipulation.
The Committee has authorized subpoenas, which I have not issued, for the information you have failed to provide. Please send your written responses to the Committee, including any and all requested documents, no later than August 28, to avoid any further action to compel them.
Marcie Wheeler is a Comparative Literature Ph.D. who wrote her thesis on what amounted to ancient blogs – short newspaper essays. And now she’s become the master of the modern version. Here, she keeps us posted of the doings of Bradley Schlozman, the most infuriating DOJ person yet. He’s resigned [who hasn’t? it’s all the rage], but he sat in that Committee Hearing and lied through his teeth about why he filed a voter case right before an election – a big no-no. Well, Senator Leahy isn’t letting go, nor is Marcie. Just because the entire DOJ and White House DOJ liason Staff have resigned is no reason to stop the investigation. What happened at the DOJ was as rotten as Watergate [and Nigergate]. It continues to demand our close attention. Thanks to Dr. emptywheel for keeping us on task…
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