Last night I had a long discussion with Brendan of Brendan Calling. Brendan specializes in all things Arlen Specter. We had a debate over whether Arlen was aware of the language that was slipped into the Patriot Act that allowed the President to ‘appoint US Attorneys indefinitely while bypassing the Senate confirmation process.’
Brendan cited Arlen’s notoriously imperious style over his staff (earning him the nickname ‘Snarlin’ Arlen). He refused to believe that any staff member on Arlen’s staff would have the chutzpah to insert language into a bill without consulting their boss.
[As an aside, at this point in the conversation a young woman (and total stranger) that was sitting within earshot at the bar, interjected to tell us that she had catered a bat mitzvah at the Specter’s house and that Arlen had stiffed the entire catering crew.]
I, on the other hand, pushed forward the theory that someone from DOJ or Karl’s shop had ‘gotten to’ a member of Specter’s staff. My logic went like this:
Arlen would not have supported a clause that stripped the Senate of power. If he was somehow convinced to support it, he would have muscled it through the committee, rather than trying to pull a fast one on his colleagues.
Moreover, the plot to insert this language into the Patriot Act was hatched a long-time before it was actually passed into law. The DOJ and Rove were clearly involved in a conspiracy to sneak this language into the bill, and telling the Chairman of the Judiciary committee would have left things up to chance.
In the end, Brendan and I agreed that both our theories had at least 50% plausibility. Yet, this morning I think we have further evidence to support my side. It comes from statements Arlen made in a March 6, 2007 hearing:
Specter: The first I found out about the change in the PATRIOT Act occurred a few weeks ago when Senator Feinstein approached me on the floor and made a comment about two U.S. attorneys who were replaced under the authority of the change in law in the PATRIOT Act, which altered the way U.S. attorneys are replaced.
Prior to the PATRIOT Act, U.S. attorneys were replaced by the attorney general for 120 days, and then appointments by the court, or the first assistant succeeded to the position of U.S. attorney. And the PATRIOT Act gave broader powers to the attorney general to appoint replacement U.S. attorneys.
I then contacted my very able chief counsel, Michael O’Neill, to find out exactly what had happened. And Mr. O’Neill advised me that the
requested change had come from the Department of Justice, that it was handled by Brett Tolman, who is now the U.S. attorney for Utah and that
the change had been requested by the Department of Justice because there had been difficulty with the replacement of a U.S. attorney in South Dakota, where the court made a replacement which was not in accordance with the statute. Hadn’t been a prior federal employee and did not qualify.And there was also concern because, in a number of districts, the courts had questioned the propriety of their appointing power because of separation of powers. And, as Mr. Tolman explained it to Mr. O’Neill, those were the reasons and the provision was added to the PATRIOT Act, and, as I say, was open for public inspection for more than three months while the conference report was not acted on.
If you’ll recall, Senator Schumer came to the floor on December 16th, said he had been disposed to vote for the PATRIOT Act, but had changed his mind when the “New York Times” disclosed the secret wiretap program, electronic surveillance. May the record show that Senator Schumer is nodding in the affirmative. There’s something we can agree on.
In fact, we agree sometimes in addition. Well, the conference report wasn’t acted on for months, and at that time this provision was subject to review. Now, I read in the newspaper that the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Arlen Specter, slipped it in, and I take umbrage and offense to that. I did not slip it in and I do not slip things in. That is not my practice.
If there is some item which I have any idea is controversial, I tell everybody about it. That’s what I do, so I found it offensive to have the report of my slipping it in. That’s how it got into the bill.
Now, I’ve talked about the matter with Senator Feinstein, and I do agree that we ought to change it back to where it was before. She and I, I think, will be able to agree on the executive session on Thursday. And let’s be candid about it. The atmosphere in Washington, D.C., is one of
high-level suspicion. There is a lot of suspicion about the executive branch because of what’s happened with signing statements, because of
what’s happened with the surveillance program.
As Brendan would be the first to point out, we’d be a little naive to take Arlen at his word. But, let’s give him the benefit of the doubt for a moment.
1) He claims the request came from the Department of Justice.
2) It was handled by Brett Tolman, a member of the Judiciary committee’s staff.
3) Tolman was then rewarded by an appointment as the U.S. Attorney for Utah.
On the surface, that is exactly what I would expect to find. Brendan and I were working from the assumption that the person responsible was Arlen’s (still) chief counsel, Michael O’Neill. I had to acknowledge that it was hard to explain why O’Neill had not been fired if he went behind Arlen’s back and put this language into the bill. But, now we have an explanation. Tolman, not O’Neill, was responsible. And Arlen couldn’t fire Tolman because he was already employed elsewhere as an U.S. Attorney. Straight up quid pro quo.
But it gets even more interesting. There were two candidates for the Utah position. The administration and the DOJ favored Kyle Sampson, while the Judiciary Committee, in deference to Orrin Hatch, preferred Tolman. Kyle Sampson was Alberto Gonzales’ chief of staff and the mastermind of the attorney purge. Tolman was the man that used to sneak the language into the bill.
It’s a dirty business, eh?
OK, here’s some really wild speculation:
Specter actually thinks that the Bush administration is a detriment to our great country. He allowed this provision into the PATRIOT act, maybe with the full knowledge of Leahy and/or Schumer, because they knew exactly what BushCo wanted to do with it. They laid a trap, or, rather, saw an opportunity. (Kind of reminiscent of Bush I telling Saddam the US had no opinion of his intentions toward Kuwait.)
Or is that giving them way too much credit?
Yeah. I think that is improbable.
Arlen has a habit of kicking and screaming before giving Bush exactly what he wants, and he has a habit of pretending to be surprised when he learns the repercussions of what he’s done. That’s Brendan’s point, and it is a well-reasoned point.
My point is that this seems to have been an actual covert operation and that the person that pulled it off was given a job in return for his dirty work.
FWIW – I always thought that it was your theory. No way he does this himself in a stealth manner.
Yeah I covered some of this in my diary, and Brendan cited it too:
http://www.boomantribune.com/?op=displaystory;sid=2007/3/14/10533/3709
also at Lutton Square
(h/t to various TPM Muckraker commenters)
The prosecutor purge scandal seems to gravitate around some very interesting machinations involving the candidates for United States Attorney for the District of Utah.
When the position opened up in early 2006, two candidates–one from the executive branch and one from the legislative–surfaced. A former White House staffer and then Chief of Staff for the Attorney General, Kyle Sampson, was favored by White House and Department of Justice officials, while influential Utah Senator and former Senate Judiciary Chair Orrin Hatch preferred former Utah federal prosecutor and Judiciary staffer Brett Tolman.
President Bush finally nominated Tolman for the position in June, 2006, after the renewal of the USA PATRIOT Act in early March. According to then Senate Judiciary Chair Arlen Specter, Tolman arranged for the Patriot Act renewal to include–via Senator Specter’s chief counsel, Michael O’Neill–the now infamous clause allowing the president to appoint US Attorneys indefinitely while bypassing the Senate confirmation process.
With two candidates, one a White House pick and the other a Senators’ pick, the White House gets new power to indefinitely appoint future US Attorneys, while the Senators’ get their guy the post in Utah.
Quid pro quo? You decide…
I believe that Tolman was actually employed by Specter’s office, not the judiciary. That’s how Andrew Sullivan described the relationship. A visit to Orrin Hatch’s site finds that“Following Tolman’s success as counsel under Hatch’s chairmanship, current Judiciary Committee chairman, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Penn.), selected Tolman to continue leading the committee’s crime and terrorism.” (complete with a photo of the evildoer)
And again, I am to believe that Arlen Specter’s chief counsel O’Neill, AND Tolman, who it seems Arlen personally chose to continue working in the Judiciary Committee, kept their boss in the dark?
There’s more going on here. You may be right.
One thign is unquestionably true: the girl at the bar was so fine, it blew my mind.
where do you have evidence that O’Neill knew anything before Specter asked him to look into it?
where do get that Tolman was a member of Specter’s staff and not merely a member of the Judiciary staff?
“where do you have evidence that O’Neill knew anything before Specter asked him to look into it?”
Later Update: OK. In later remarks in response to Feinstein, Specter said that he actually didn’t know about the added provision until Feinstein approached him recently about the issue. After Feinstein’s inquiry, Specter says, he asked his chief counsel about the issue, who then explained what had happened. So according to him, Specter’s staff was responsible for the provision, but Specter himself didn’t know about it. (emphasis mine)
and here: nd, yes, it is my observation that this is very typical of the way the sausage gets made. Especially in the case of these enormous bills, much of the real writing work is done on a staffer-to-staffer level, with members trusting their aides to protect them and the people who elected them. Most of the time, this is efficient and perfectly harmless, but occasionally–as Specter himself seems to acknowledge–lawmakers open the door to consequences they never intended.: (emphasis mine)
“where do get that Tolman was a member of Specter’s staff and not merely a member of the Judiciary staff?”
From here: Crazy Andy (crazy andy may be wrong, I concede).
But beyond that, even if Sully is wrong, he was personally chosen by Specter to continue in the Judiciary after Hatch left. It’s in Hatch’s press releases at his senate site.
The NYT link in my diary also cites Tolman as a Judiciary staffer…
It is a fine distinction when we are talking about a staffer on a committee that Arlen chairs. But some of those committee staffers are Democrats, and they are certainly not synonymous with Arlen’s staff. In this case, the staffer was certainly a Hatch(et)-man, and that presents and interesting new angle on this . But just because Arlen kept him on staff doesn’t mean he had any loyalty to him, or would turn down an offer for a US Attorney job in exchange for inserting this language.
If Sully is wrong, then my theory needs tweaking.
In any event, Specter still looks like a dope, since it’s pretty lear that his chief counsel was in on this.
I wouldn’t rely solely on Sully’s word on anything. He’s been sloppy or outright wrong too many times. You need another corroborating source Brendan.
AF
For the sake of clarity, it’s worth noting that Spector inherited Brett Tolman from previous Judiciary Committee Orrin Hatch. That explains the committee’s deference to Hatch in Tolman’s appointment over Sampson.
AF
when has specter done anything against the bush regime?
he will whine but he never actually does anything.
bad tipper too….figures.
i was at an orgy at his neighbors house once….the place was full of cokehead republicans….very creepy…although i didnt see arlen.
A republican orgy? Let me guess the address: K Street?
no actually it was on school house lane.
i have noticed a difference between liberal and conservative orgys and kink parties.
at conservative orgies the men are old and not very attractive and the women are usually gorgeous.
at liberal orgies its the exact opposite.
i think its because at liberal parties its mostly real couples as opposed to conservative kink parties where the women are almost always hired to be there.