Gonzales refuses to send witness to Hill for voting rights hearing

Michael Roston

Published: Tuesday July 17, 2007 Print This Email This

Two House Democrats criticized Attorney General Alberto Gonzales for refusing to send a witness to the House Judiciary Committee for a hearing on voting rights. In response, the committee postponed a hearing that had been scheduled for this morning.

Reps. John Conyers and Jerrold Nadler, respectively the Chairs of the House Judiciary Committee and Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties, criticized the decision by Gonzales.

"We are disappointed by this decision," they wrote to the Attorney General. "Mr. Tanners testimony is important to the Committees efforts to understand the manner in which the Department has implemented its legislative mandate. As Chief of the Voting Section, Mr. Tanner is personally familiar with the facts surrounding the Departments decisions in significant and controversial voting rights cases. "

Gonzales had offered to send a Deputy Assistant Attorney General in Tanner's place.

In the letter, the two Congressmembers also expressed their desire to work with Gonzales to secure Tanner's testimony.

Controversy has emerged in the management of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division. Earlier in the year, an ex-Justice employee told the House Committee that the office had been heavily politicized with political appointees creating an environment deemed hostile by many career attorneys, who quite their posts. Subsequently, a former Voting Section Chief acknowledged to the Senate Judiciary Committee that he had bragged about primarily hiring Republicans for career positions in a June hearing.



