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| Attorney General Alberto Gonzales gave his resignation on Monday and leaves his position Sept. 17. Andy Nelson – staff |
Gonzales makes his exit
Farewell: Attorney General Alberto Gonzales gave his resignation on Monday and leaves his position Sept. 17.
By Peter Grier | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitorfrom the August 28, 2007 edition
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Washington - The resignation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales eliminates one of the administration's most controversial figures and may help the White House regain some momentum on crucial domestic issues during President Bush's final 18 months in office.
Attorney General Gonzales's departure does create one immediate problem – how to replace him. Democrats are sure to use confirmation hearings for his successor as a forum for criticizing Gonzales in particular and Bush administration legal policies in general.
But given that lawmakers of both parties have long urged Gonzales to resign it might be politically difficult for Democrats to block a reasonable nominee.
"Anybody is going to look good following Alberto Gonzales," says Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia.
At a short news conference on August 27 Gonzales announced he will resign effective September 17. He gave no reason for his departure. He touched briefly on the distance he has traveled, from his upbringing as the son of a construction worker to Harvard Law School and eventually the Justice Department.
"Even my worst days as Attorney General have been better than my father's best days," said Gonzales.
Shortly afterward, Mr. Bush acknowledged the resignation and defended Gonzales as a man unfairly vilified by his critics.
"It is sad that we live in a time when a talented and honorable person is impeded from doing important work because his good name has been dragged through the mud for political reasons," said Bush.
But in the end President Bush may have been Gonzales's lone defender. The Attorney General's halting explanations to Congress of controversial actions, such as the mass firing of US attorneys last year, lost him the support of many lawmakers. Some accused him of outright lies. Even many in the GOP thought he seemed to be in over his head.
In that sense his departure was a resignation foretold. The biggest surprise was that it did not come earlier, said some experts. Gonzales withstood months of pounding from Capitol Hill.
Democrats accused Gonzales of removing US attorneys for improper political reasons. They hit on his support of the administration's warrantless wiretapping activities, and his defense of the administration's rules approving harsh treatment of suspected terrorist detainees.
"He continued to be a sort of punching bag and a target for Congress," says Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond. "So that's been removed."
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