Enough Is Enough, Joe Rich: An Uncivil Man from the Civil Rights Division
Over the last five years, the Bush administration’s Civil Rights Division has been subjected to blistering criticism, motivated almost exclusively by partisan and radical politics. The great bulk of these attacks have been penned by former lawyers from the Division, long considered to be the home of many of the most radical left-wing ideologues in the entire executive branch.
The criticism mostly consists of the same tired, recycled rhetoric that the left trots out every time Republicans occupy the Justice Department, and it’s no more convincing now than it ever was. In countless columns, I have shown why these attacks, including the inspector general’s biased, inaccurate, and partisan report on hiring, are meritless. Yet the hypocrisy of those primarily responsible for waging the assaults is not widely known.
It should surprise no one that the baseless attacks are largely driven by the left’s desperate effort to justify the array of radical policy shifts and transgressions of the Holder Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division over the past two years. What is problematic, though, is that the lawyers authoring this criticism have been consistently portrayed by the media as apolitical, virtuous, career civil servants.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
One of the loudest critics has been the former chief of the Division’s Voting Section, Joseph Rich. Rich has falsely claimed that there has never been anything “close to the type of politicization” that occurred in the Bush administration. Ever since he took advantage of a $25,000 buyout for Justice employees and retired in 2005, Rich has been writing editorials for left-wing publications, making the rounds at liberal policy forums, and peddling to any reporter within earshot his contrived, conspiracy-laden theories about the supposed politicization of the Voting Section during the prior administration. Rich launches these broadsides from his current job as a senior director at the highly radical Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.
The reason I have reluctantly been forced to finally highlight some of the lowlights of Rich’s tenure in the Civil Rights Division is that he has injected himself into a variety of significant election issues affecting this nation, including now the dismissal of the New Black Panther Party voter intimidation case.
He has filed an affidavit with the U.S. Civil Rights Commission disputing some of the allegations made in the Commission’s investigation, including my own sworn affidavit, making his veracity and credibility a public issue. He has unfairly painted the attorneys on that case as partisans, while at the same time he hides in the shadows as a partisan of the worst kind — a dishonest partisan. Rich is entitled to write and give whatever opinions he wants. But his treatment in the media as nothing more than a long-time, apolitical civil servant who eschewed politics during his tenure in the Division should stop.
Rich allowed rank politics to pervade the Division to a degree almost unimaginable. It is time for the media to learn some inconvenient truths about the real Joe Rich, which also reflect the professionalism (or lack thereof) and partisanship of so many of the other lawyers in the Division.
The AIDS Smear
One of the most telling incidents about Rich was his actions toward my former colleague and friend, Joe Beard. Beard and I were both hired to work on election reform issues in the Voting Section, although Beard began slightly before me in 2001. Prior to his arrival, Beard had been active in Republican politics (just as many other Voting Section attorneys were active in Democratic politics in their pre-DOJ days) and had worked as a special counsel to the assistant attorney general for civil rights during the Reagan and Bush I administrations.
Rich knew all about this history and seemed bound and determined to make Beard’s life miserable. Rich, however, wasn’t content with petty snipes, and he eventually crossed the line from harmless political gossip to vindictive animosity and personal character assassination.
It occurred in a conversation Rich was having with Chris Coates, then a trial attorney in the Voting Section. (Many readers will recognize Coates as the Voting Section chief whose authority was stripped from him by the new Obama political leadership in the Civil Rights Division, and who was subsequently “transferred” to South Carolina in early 2010.) Rich commented how much he resented having Beard in the Section because of his work in the Reagan years under former Assistant Attorney General Brad Reynolds. Coates listened attentively, but said nothing.
Then, out of the blue, Rich pointed out that Beard suffered from AIDS, a fact largely unknown outside a small group of Beard’s closest friends, and personal information available to Rich only because of his supervisory position in the Voting Section.
Coates was simultaneously stunned and revolted that Rich would reveal such confidential information. Coates had absolutely no reason to know this information and couldn’t believe that Rich would stoop to such a level in the name of rank politics. Character assassination clearly mattered little to Rich, but it was a very big deal to a gentleman like Coates, who recounted what happened to me. There is a basic level of human decency that one would hope individuals of all political stripes would respect. Joe Rich didn’t show it.
This incident demonstrated that Rich could not be trusted and was beyond redemption. Sadly, Joe Beard died soon after I learned of Rich’s distasteful comments. We can only hope that Beard was not fully aware of the terrible things being said about him by his boss.
Mercifully, I was transferred out of Voting to the front office of the Division approximately one year after I first started at Justice to work as a career counsel to the assistant attorney general.
Someone should send this article to Barbara Arwine, and Nancy Anderson at Microsoft, and Atiba Adams at Pfizer, Brad Phillips at Brad.Phillips@mto.com and John Kiernan at jskiernan@debevoise.com, all of whom are responsible for employing this character. I doubt they want the attention that is about to focus on this man and his employer.
If this country’s “Law Enforcement” continues to refuse to enforce the laws in a fair unbiased manner, as they did in the case of the black terrorists at the Philadelphia polling place and as they are doing in the CURRENT situation where they are refusing to insure the voter rolls contain only people who are eligible to vote, then civil war is coming and soon.
Simple solution: Dissolve the DOJ. Let the states take care of “civil rights” cases. I am sick of the left telling us by judicial fiat what is right, legal and fair.
Sounds like a plan!
I won’t say for sure, but I’d bet a fiver that Joe Rich is a committed communist, and that the behavior was not simple egregious behavior (not that communists can’t be nasty, disgusting people) but deliberately intended to accomplish something.
I’d say you’re probably right.
How do “we the people” get rid of the agenda-driven unelected beaurocRATs out
of their tax funded jobs? Do we have only whistleblowers to rely on? Even the
Inspector General offices have become politicized.
Elections matter and I hope there is a “we the people” majority in the House
and Senate, January 2011. Then I pray the Congress has the guts to turn Darrall
Issa, R-Ca. loose on they whole bunch. I would gladly pay more taxes to fund
Issa and like minded citizen patriots. Actually we would save money by getting
rid of these tax wasting subversives.
Jail time at Gitmo,starting with Holder, would make my day.
Jan, you seem to think these people are Americans. They are not! They hate America. They hate Americans. And they hate you especially if you are white and a believer in the American dream.
Elections do not matter to these people. Laws do not matter to these people. Only power matters to these people. And like Mark@2 said, civil war is coming because the left and us cannot live together anymore in this nation.
Furthermore every time “we” get a majority (Sen. McConnel) “we” fail to lead (GWB, RINOs)and hold the left accountable because “we” are afraid of the MSM.
How can I say this? What we have here is a failure to communicate. If partisans of EITHER side, bring a hyper partisan viewpoint & actions to what is supposed to be a non partisan position, then congress must intervene. Now that we have a majority Democratic congress, such intervention is not only unlikely, its a virtual impossibility. Since Obama, this nation has experienced massive partisanship & while that may be what politics is all about, the problem is many hyper partisans are illegally using their government positions to trample on anyone who disagrees with them.
The American people cannot afford “another” agency to oversee these people. Worse is that even if we could, who’s to say that agency would not turn hyper partisan. Given that Democrats seem to control much of the federal bureaucracy & have for decades, it is now patently obvious our federal government system has been infiltrated & corrupted by these partisans.
So folks, the REAL solution is, significantly reduce the size of our federal government. No, MASSIVELY reduce its size. Drive these people out of government where they not only enjoy power but the wealth of a government position. Its time we forced them out into the private sector. Its also time we reduced the influential capabilities of the trial lawyer or legal system. Lawyers have gotten far too out of control & its time we put their influence out to pasture. Laws are needed by actual patriots that limit the ability of lawyers to destroy people & crush them financially with lawsuits & threats of lawsuits. What they have come up with in our system now appears to be a system of extortion & coercion that simply must be stopped.
These are even more of the reasons for the Tea party movement. Be a partisan all you want, BUT, never use it to attack or destroy others or, you will face your own destruction by the people!
Well said…DITTO
Rubicon: Like the avatar.
“Be a partisan all you want, BUT, never use it to attack or destroy others or, you will face your own destruction by the people!”
I agree with almost everything you wrote with the above exception. You are beginning to sound like Bill O’Really. The left has been rabidly parisan since 1930 and they have done well thank you-0bama.
I think we, the right, need to finally be more partisan. We have always been the ones in Congress to pursue comity (McLame, Grahmnesty, etc) while the left (Leahy, Kennedy) always got their way.
Unless I am misreading you, but it has been our lack of partisanship (Hatch, “my friend…”) that has partially gotten us into this mess.
People like Joe Rich have no morals or sense of common decency, they are driven by political madness. They have a deep sickness and believe Alinsky’s “at any cost, the ends justify the means.” We need to eliminate this cancer in and on our Government. We need to stop the “Party trumps Country” mentality that is so pervasive.
Exactly my thoughts. I pray for our country as much as possible. Hoping that peoples’ hearts will turn to the LORD and HE will revive this country through them.
It is past time for Holder’s scalp.
Not only Presidents can be impeached and removed.
Just sayin’.
Rich should be punsihed for the use of personal information. Maybe 40 strokes of the hwip would be adequate for this kind of idiocy.
Issa needs to ensure that Thomas Perez at the DOJ is prosecuted for perjury and sent to prison if convicted! Conservatives in this country have to fight this corruption without mercy. It is a cancer to our freedoms. You don’t half-ass fight cancer. You have to destroy it!
It could easily be assumed that Mr. Rich is a radical given his willingness to compromise integrity to further the cause of his party. Has anyone ever heard of a moderate or “blue dog” democrat going to such extremes?
Here is a link to a site that lists Members of Congress who belong to the Socialist Pary of America caucus.
http://gatewaypundit.firstthings.com/2010/08/american-socialists-release-names-of-70-congressional-democrats-in-their-caucus/
I have a few democrat friends who have been complaining about how the marxists have hijacked their party. They say it’s all run by the Democratic Socialists now.
One is an ex-democrat who is now registered as an independent. I asked him why the switch and he said, “Too many progressive-marxist types.”
I have a question: Does Mr. Rich still have a law license? The question is in regards to the fact that Mr. Rich, while serving in the DoJ is still subject to the Rules of Professionalism that all lawyers are subject to. While most of the allegations here betray internal malfeasance, the allegation that Mr. Rich intentionally spiked a case by deleting portions of an investigation memo constitute a breach of ethics, possible necessitating Mr. Rich’s disbarment.
First, by spiking the case, he was objectively working against the interests of his client (the U.S. government) and because it was in the pursuit of his own political beliefs, there is also a not insubstantial conflict of interest claim. Furthermore, by initially lying to his supervisor about this matter, he committed another ethical violation by lying to an officer of the court (assuming his supervisor was also an attorney) and, by proxy, committing a fraud upon his client.
I guess this raises another question: Given that we, as lawyers, are under an OBLIGATION to report such un-ethical activity, were his co-workers that were privy to this information not lawyers themselves? Did they not report Mr. Rich to the ethics review board? Why are they not reporting these activities now?
Just something to ponder…
They were probably under a very real threat of legal retaliation (trumped-up charges and the like) and extralegal retaliation (bodily harm or worse) against themselves and their families.
Wow, where’s the Southern Poverty Law Center when you need um’.
The SPLC is just about as crooked as an organization could be. It was put together in order to make money for lawyers, and that’s exactly what it has done.
I bet Saul Alinsky would be proud? Right Hillary and Barack?