House Oversight Committee Finds Holder in Contempt of Congress
The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee voted 23-17 along party lines to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt of Congress today, pushing forward with the action even after the White House slapped an 11th-hour executive privilege on subpoenaed documents still sought in the Operation Fast and Furious investigation.
Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) said an official communication from President Obama had not been received by Congress at the time of this morning’s meeting, but the committee had received a multi-page letter from Deputy Attorney General James M. Cole informing them of the action just minutes before the hearing, which was scheduled earlier this month.
“We regret that we have arrived at this point, after the many steps we have taken to address the Committee’s concerns and to accommodate the Committee’s legitimate oversight interests regarding Operation Fast and Furious,” Cole wrote. “Although we are deeply disappointed that the Committee appears intent on proceeding with a contempt vote, the Department remains willing to work with the Committee to reach a mutually satisfactory resolution of the outstanding issues.”
“Our purpose has never been to hold the attorney general in contempt,” Issa said in the hearing’s opening, noting that Holder was offered an accommodation to produce the requested documents on the Fast and Furious gun-walking scandal. “As late as last night his offer was only to give us a briefing and then only if we ended the investigation.”
“This untimely assertion by the Justice Department falls short of any reason to delay today’s proceedings,” the chairman said of the executive privilege.
“Members on both side of the dais have repeatedly said we owe it to the Terry family to get to the truth.”
Ranking Member Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), who conferred with an aide during Issa’s opening statement, read from part of the document after noting that “we need to study this and make sure we understand what the president is asserting here.”
Among the reasons in the document was “such compelled disclosure would be inconsistent with the separation of powers in the Constitution.”
Cummings said that Holder didn’t ask the committee to end its investigation, but all he requested in return was “ending this contempt fight.”
“I heard what he said, it was very clear. It was a fair and reasonable offer,” Cummings said, then launching into an attack on Issa for “partisan and highly inflammatory personal attacks” on Holder.
“For the past year, you’ve been holding the attorney general to an impossible standard,” he said. “Last night you flatly rejected the attorney general’s offer. Instead you rushed to a prearranged press conference to declare the meeting a failure.”
“Mr. Chairman, it did not have to be this way,” Cummings added. “The position and prestige of this committee has been diminished.”
Other Democrats on the committee likewise lashed out at Issa for the contempt report and citation hearing. “I am horrified that you are going forward with this contempt charge when the president of the United States and administration have invoked executive privilege,” said Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.). “…I am offended personally by your calling the attorney general a liar.”
“I want to apologize to the American people for yet another show of ‘gotcha’ politics in this body,” said Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.).
“With sensational charges, reckless accusations and by exploiting a tragedy, the majority tried to create the scandal they were looking for,” said Rep. William Lacy Clay (D-Mo.). “When one starts out with the presumption of guilt, of a cover-up – as the Majority did when they began this investigation – it’s extremely difficult to admit when one is proven wrong.”
But despite protestations that the assertion of executive privilege warranted postponing today’s vote, it was the Republican majority that backed the chairman and pushed the contempt citation through.
“I want to compliment our chairman for being so patient,” said Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.). “There’s no question in anybody’s mind that’s been involved in this investigation that the attorney general has been stonewalling this committee.”
“The president’s assertion of executive privilege creates even more questions,” Burton added.
Good for the GOP to stand up to this stonewalling.
““How can the President assert executive privilege if there was no White House involvement?” Grassley said in a statement. “How can the President exert executive privilege over documents he’s supposedly never seen? Is something very big being hidden to go to this extreme?””
Excellent questions.
I predict a lot of document shredding on Nov. 7.
Obamma and Holder have set the black race back a generation. If not more. Imagine how different things would be if the Rat party had put up someone like Collin Powel ( spit ) or even Harold Ford Jr. ( spit ). Instead they manufacture a candidate out of NOTHING. A golum. An imaginary construct whose handlers don’t even understand. This sick generation has murdered the greatest most egalitarian nation in history.
I think you’re reaching for “golem”. But Gollum works, too, me precious.
In South Kenya its “Golem”. In North Kenya its “Golum”.In the hood, its “Goleumothah”.
Gollum had a more-or-less good side.
Not so Obama.
There is not a single shred of evidence for anything whatsoever good in him.
I find it impossible to believe that he is human at all. His being a purely demonic presence would explain the lack of a valid birth certificate, college transcripts, and so forth. I would suggest that Barack Hussein Obama exists today only because it is impossible to kill an entity that was never truly alive in the first place.
I am very disappointed at the comments reported here from some of the democratic members of the panel. Not content to simply vote against the contempt action, they speak of “impossible standards”, “gotcha politics”, and that this scandal was “created” by the majority party.
I don’t need a law degree or presidential appointment to know enough not to send hundreds of guns to drug cartels in Mexico while gun battles rage across that country and thousands of police and law enforcement people have been killed there over the years. Impossible standard? The only thing impossible is to think F&F was a good idea.
“Gotcha politics” ? Well, only if you hold party loyalty above integrity, murder, the Constitution, and respect for the life of Mexican citizens.
“Created by the majority” ? No Republican in their wildest dreams would conjure up this scenario.
I am very disappointed by the craven lack of courage and common sense displayed by the congressional representatives who made these comments.
F & F may have looked like a VERY good deal, if the goal was to sway public opinion against American gun ownership.
To hell with what it’ll cost in Mexican and border agent lives, full steam ahead! — may have been an excellent motto for the DoJ and President EO(bama).
I am and have been very disappointed in the Republican Congress for not starting an investigation into the crimes committed by Barack Hussein Obama enabling him to keep Americans from realizing he is not a “natural born Citizen.” He has been flaunting a computer generated birth certificate and a forged selective service card. He has also been flagged by E-Verify for being in possession of a fraudulent SS#. Republican Congresspersons have the details, all of it given to them via hand delivered and special delivery. Congresspersons like Allen West, Rand Paul, Marco Rubio, the heroes of the Tea Party. They are all corrupted and they might just as well be driving the get-a-way car. At this point they are just as guilty as the offender. Sheriff Joe Arpaio will eventually become America’s hero and what a day that will be.
Five more months.
heh
I we really want to think ‘politics’, then visualize Issa and company stringing this out for five more months.
The odds are better that it will build, as Watergate did, rather than fade away.
It’s possible that there will be metaphorical hounds, baying bloodily across the frozen midnight moors, by the time November inexorably rolls around.
That said, I fervently hope that Issa does what is right, not what is expedient or politically effective. If he does, then what is ‘right’ will be those hounds.
June is 2/3 over!
Four More Months!
(don’t make it any longer than it has to be.)
Can we call her Baloney Maloney? My understanding is Holder under oath before the committee has contradicted earlier testimony he then claimed was true. Had Ms.Baloney been awake during the hearings, she would know this.
It is not a case of Holder being a liar. That has already been documented beyond a reasonable doubt. The question is what else has he lied about and how badly his lies have damaged the country.
Bravo Rep Issa. Let this be the first salvo to rid America of this Chicago thugocracy.
The Daily Rash reported that when Holder forced Dayton, Ohio to lower its passing test scores to allow more African Americans to be hired, Dayton got a new Police Chief and lots of eager recruits. The article reveals how smart Attorney General Holder really is. http://www.thedailyrash.com/dayton-ohio-gets-a-new-police-chief-courtesy-of-eric-holder
“along party lines”
Never a single demonrat with balls enough to follow the truth instead of obeying the Politburo. Miserable examples of “homo sovieticus”, always.
It will be interesting to see if any Dems go along in the House vote. Issa predicts some defections . . .
Sensible dems need to realize that Obama is poisoning the dem brand in the same way that Bush poisened the repub brand in 2006-2008, and if they dont break with him now, there will be nothing left of their party soon. Some dems like Manchin, Booker, and Clinton are starting to get the message, but not enough. The goal of the dems now should be the same as many repubs in 2008, recognize that their incompetant prez will drag them down to epic defeat, and prepare the ground to repair and reform the party after the coming 2012 defeat. If the dems can purge themselves of their worst corruption (starting with Obama/Reid/Pelosi, the same way the Tea Party purged much of the corruption from the repubs), they will have a chance for a comeback in 2014-2016, especially if the repubs overeach.
Their main tasks for these reform dems will be:
1. Purge themselves of corruption and cronyism
2. Start applying their own standards to themselves (ie: If you would not tolerate something if a repub did it, then dont tolerate it if a dem does it).
3. Get the fanatics out of any regulatory positions, and get people that will honestly enforce the law, not some raving fanatic with an idealogical agenda.
4. Find a policy to get runaway spending and waste under control, so the nation can afford to trust them with the purse strings.
5. I would still expect these new dems to be dems, but they should at least be dems that we can afford to leave in charge for awhile without fearing for the future of our nation.
If the dems can do this, they can provide a real alternative. And I might even vote for them if the repubs ignore the Tea Party and slip back to the repub version of cronyism, incompetance, and corruption, as they did under Bush. But if the dems cannot reform themselves, I fear for our country, because we cannot aford to become a one party country. We must have an opposition party that we can afford to see win without the country being destroyed.
June 20, 2012 More Dems Ditch Convention
http://www.thedaily.com/page/2012/06/20/web-news-dems-distancing-from-obama/
“Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this Presidency”
… Barack Obama
Well….
We can all see through him at least.
“Going forward, anytime the American people want to know something that I or a former president wants to withhold, we will have to consult with the Attorney General and the white house counsel, whose business it is to ensure compliance with the rule of law. Information will not be withheld just because I say so; it will be withheld because a separate authority believes my request is well-grounded in the Constitution. Let me say it as simply as I can: transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency,”
The full qoute and context.
Doesn’t quite match up with todays actions!
“The full qoute and context.”
If you had supplied the full context, you would have identified when and where Obama said the cited text. Did he say this during the campaign? After he had become president? During a national TV broadcast? During a speech to a party gathering?
This is a major diversion, one of a series of diversions (the supposed “war on women” and the Treyvon Martin case were some others) aimed at drawing our attention away from Obama’s record and the results of his catastrophic and malignant policies and actions and focusing them, instead, on matters of ultimately less importance.
A battle that Obama & Co. and Holder are only too glad to wage, and want us to focus on.
Because, while we are focusing in on and devoting our attention and energies and discussions to this–the magician’s very ostentatiously waving hand–we aren’t watching the other hand, focusing in on, analyzing, and discussing the whole range of failed Obama policies and actions and their effects; the flat-lined housing market and virtually moribund economy, Obama’s fraudulent and failed “Green economy” and crony capitalism, massive debt, voter fraud, out of control Entitlement spending, the faltering dollar, a nuclear Iran, the gutting of our military, illegal aliens and our porous border, the Energy crisis and prices, over-regulation that destroys businesses and prevents any kind of robust economic recovery, government overreach in all areas, etc., etc., and what increasingly appear to be the overall dire prospects for our future.
Attempting to subvert the Constitution by manufacturing a crisis in order to gain public support to further erode the 2nd amendment…that’s one Obama policy that I’m very glad has failed.
There certainly was criminal behavior involved inside our government, and people were killed on both sides of the border.
Just the latest and most blatant example in a long list in the most corrupt administration in our lifetimes.
This certainly warrants some looking into, as well as everything else you just mentioned.
Just because the “news” media has a short attention span doesn’t mean that we have a short one too.
Russia, China, Iran to Hold Large Exercise in Syria
http://rusnavy.com/news/navy/index.php?ELEMENT_ID=15374
Executive Privilege? The Department of Justice allowed guns to be sold and delivered to Mexican drug cartels.
The barbaric drug cartels work very closely with the A team of Muslim terrorists: Hezbollah.
MURDER is against the Law. Hundreds of Mexican innocents and U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry were MURDERED by the guns supplied by the Obama-Clinton-Holder George Soros administration.
Where is justice? Why are the guilty not being prosecuted for the murders of HUNDREDS of INNOCENTS?
Bible, Genesis 4:10 And God said, “What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood cries out to Me from the ground”.
“This amendment smacks of ‘it’s Bush’s fault’,” said Rep. James Lankford (R-Okla.), quipping that if the committee wants to go back to the Bush years the Obama administration would be more than willing to turn over everything in regard to that operation.
Yes. Ask your Democrat friends: If this whole thing started under Bush and it’s essentially some Bush/Gonzales/Cheney monstrosity, why isn’t Holder releasing the docs that say so? If as so many Dems claim this started under Bush and Holder is the hero who stopped it, he should be brandishing the evidence.
‘“With sensational charges, reckless accusations and by exploiting a tragedy, the majority tried to create the scandal they were looking for,” said Rep. William Lacy Clay (D-Mo.).’
‘A letter from Terry’s family was brought forth at the committee during the debate on the amendments, saying that “the documents sought should be produced and turned over to the committee” and stressing that Holder’s stonewalling “serves to compound this tragedy.”’
- So by Rep. Clay’s logic, Brian Terry’s family is guilty of exploiting the death of Brian Terry because they would like to know the facts that led to their child’s death. Is this really the way you want to go, Dems? Are Holder and Obama really worth hitching your wagon to for the next 4 years?
“Members on both side of the dais have repeatedly said we owe it to the Terry family to get to the truth.”
More than that, the truth is owed to the citizens of the United States and of Mexico. Our laws were violated by our own government, and their national sovereignty was violated by our government. It isn’t only the US and one American family, that have been victimized by this lawless administration. If we don’t fix this, America’s reputation is in disrepair for decades.
afraid i’m gonna have to take up for our favorite african on this one. yessiree. he just decided (again) that there was nothing to hide, but they gonna hide it anyway. gosh, that’s honest transparency for ya.
i just wonder how much this one will cost us to hide? our freedom? our laws? our constitution? i would put national pride and respect on that list but thanks to this ship of fools, that bird has already flown.
A few random thoughts here. As a traditional conservative Republican, I generally like & respect Rep. Issa. However, in an election year, I have to wonder how all the attention on this issue really helps to solve economic problems. Regarding Rep. Burton (R-IN), he’s part of exhibit A for having term limits. Being a former Indiana resident, I don’t think Burton has had an original thought in 20 years.
#11 Seth: “Obama’s fraudulent & failed “Green economy…..” Sorry dude. You’ve missed the boat. The “green economy” was around a long time before Obama. You may want to check out recent non-partisan studies from Headwaters Economics, the Rocky Mountain Institute, State of the Rockies by Colorado College. You could also visit the energy section of http://www.conservamerica.org .
If a “green economy” is so bad, how come China is spending billions on alternative energies?
“the gutting of our military….” What gutting? How does billions in cost overruns on the F-35 fighter plane, as one example, constitute “gutting?” You also may want to do some research on conservative senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) and his ideas for reducing waste and pork in the Pentagon.
“energy crisis and prices…..” What crisis? There is a glut of natural gas with depressed prices. Last year, the US became a net exporter of petroleum products for the first time in nearly 50 years. I read recently that home heating oil prices are expected to drop in the upcoming winter.
If you’re anti-Obama, that’s fine. But at least get your facts straight.
What we have here folks is a genuine republican watermelon. Bolsheviks vs the Mensheviks, just like in the old country. The repubs will be advocating social justice and atheism next I suppose. Anything in support of a more intrusive, overbearing state. No wonder he has admiration for communist China.
Not a single word about liberty though. Sad…
“advocating social justice……….” “not a word about liberty……” Simple answer here. Live and let live. Mind your own business unless your neighbor needs help.
“advocating……atheism next……” And what’s wrong with that? A person’s religious beliefs should be private. You might want to re-read Article VI of the US Constitution regarding religious tests for holding office. The former chair of the Republican Party, the late Lee Atwater, envisioned the party as a “big tent.” These days, if you’re not “born again,” there isn’t much room in the tent.
Oh, and did I say I admired Communist China. No, I didn’t say that. I simply mentioned the fact about China’s investment in alternative energy.
“Simple answer here. Live and let live. Mind your own business unless your neighbor needs help.”=quote
In case you haven’t noticed, these are the exact same policies pushed by the left. Let us Cloward Piven ourselves into bankruptcy. And when you do, you bankrupt me and mine as well. I will suffer under the same tyranny you advocate. So it IS my business when you advocate intrusive overbearing government.
“You might want to re-read Article VI of the US Constitution regarding religious tests for holding office.”=quote
Yea, screw that first amendment thing. Free exercise is extinguished by article 6?
I suppose you advocate lions and coliseums then? Train rides to the gas chambers?
Should the republican party tolerate Marxist to increase the size of the tent? Islamic Sharia?
“These days, if you’re not “born again,” there isn’t much room in the tent.”=quote
This is a lie and you know it. This country has become a secular humanist theocracy. The only people forced to keep their faith private is Christians.
As a traditional conservative Republican, …
Priceless.
Let me just say that, speaking as a staunch progressive committed to social justice, I think that Obama should be impeached.
– Bridget, you have to be your own moderator: can’t you spot the Orcs?
Apparently, no Attorney General has ever been held to be in “Contempt” by Congress, and it is obvious that this whole procedure was geared to a different age, one in which events and developments moved at a much slower pace.
According to the information in an article from today’s “The Hill” (see http://thehill.com/homenews/house/233763-house-panel-votes-to-place-holder-in-contempt-of-congress ), if Congress were to vote that Holder were in Contempt, then this verdict would be sent to the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia (Ronald C. Machen, Jr., a Black Obama appointee) and a grand jury would have to be impaneled in Washington, D.C., to determine whether or not to indict Holder. If Holder were to be indicted by the grand jury, a trial–either a civil trial or possibly a criminal trial–would have to take place, with Machen as the Prosecutor, and with all of the opportunities such a trial would present for maneuvers, delay, and argument. If it were a civil trial, the maximum penalty would be a $1,000 fine or one year in jail.
All-in-all, what seems to be a laborious and time-consuming process.
So, you tell me.
When would you anticipate that such a process/trial—if trial there be—would render a final verdict?
Before, or after the Election?
I know that the Fast and Furious case is a very important one, many people were killed and many others are still in danger and likely to be injured or killed by the thousands of guns still in play due to the actions of a scheming, reckless, lawless, and out of control government.
However, there are a lot of other actions by this out of control, lawless government that people need to pay attention to, and their results for our while Nation—actions with effects much broader more than just those on display in the one Fast and Furious case–that have to be examined and thought on when weighing whether or not to vote Obama in for another four year term
That is why I see this as a diversion.
It turns out that for a contempt charge the house bringing the charge can also be judge and jury. For about the most definitive study of the ins and outs of procedure, see here: http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/crs/rl34097.pdf
If there were any justice in this fallen world, then Janet Reno would have been stomped to death on the steps of the Capitol. She was, and is, a truly evil woman whose only purpose in life was to ensure the continued rule of the Clinton regime.
Fast forward eight years or so, and we get the same thing with Eric Holder.
The system of checks and balances died in 1865. Secession is the only effective weapon we ever had against the endless expansion of federal tyranny. The blogosphere is a poor substitute, but I do what little I can.
This is just another election year tempest in a teapot diversion that will amount to nothing. A slap on the hand for behavior that would land the rest of us in prison. The out of control central government will continue fleecing and herding the sheeple just as it has always done.
This is not a diversion. It’s the core of a very rotten apple. The greatest of non sequiturs is that Rs can only concentrate on one problem – the economy. Excuse me, but if all you can do is think about and work on one thing, then that sounds like a personal problem to me. The Obama Precedency is a multifaceted problem, from justice to national security to the economy to immigration, you name it, he universally stinks, and we need to disabuse ourselves of the notion that any one part doesn’t “count”. It’s all rotten, and it all counts.
They got Al Capone on income tax fraud – this time it is not just the coverup it is the crime.
I’m with Grassley, the President cannot have it both ways, either he knew something and is protecting that fact with privilege, he lied. He was lying then or he is lying now. And that “deal” proposed by the AG doesn’t pass the sniff test – “I’ll let you in on the secret but you have to stop investigating” Meaning: I’m going to lie my a” off some more, but you can’t investigate to prove it.
And in an administration that leaks top secret security information, to say that confidentiality is important to this White House is laughable. Don’t look now but the fan dance is almost over.
Obama and Holder, like OBL, are guilty of mass murder. Mexico should, if it could do it, send a team in to take them both to Mexico to stand trial. It would be their right.
Or maybe a drone attack on them.
Such seems to be effective against terrorist.
“I am horrified that you are going forward with this contempt charge when the president of the United States and administration have invoked executive privilege,” said Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.). “…I am offended personally by your calling the attorney general a liar.”
I am more offended by the proven fact that HE IS A LIAR!!
I think it’s time we called a spade, a spade….
And NO, I did not mean anything racist by that. I think Archie Bunker sometimes refer to blacks as ‘spades’ but I was only using a metaphor that means “to speak the simple truth”.
Better we should call a club, a club.
The government is a private club. It’s an oligarchy. For all practical purposes, they own us, and if you are fortunate enough to have any progeny, they own them too.
Medieval serfs and antebellum slaves got to keep and/or were repaid a much greater percentage of the real wealth that they created than is the case for productive, tax-paying American citizens.
Like the USSR, it will eventually fall, but it will be much too late to do any good for most of us alive today.
The dems act as if Rep Issa and the committee gave Holder a week to produce these documents. Why were they so inflamed about the Plame affair, when she wasn’t a field agent and no one died? Talk about the dems double standard. Pelosi is another one who wanted prosecution of Bush administration officials during Plame, but now she’s (finally) worried that there are no jobs, hey Nancy, can’t we just give them more unemployment checks?
And with the president trying to use executive privelege, that will fail in the end and take Barry Soetoro down as well. How soon they forget that W used it 6 times, and the courts rejected it all 6 times.
There are very few moves left in this chess game, and the loser(s) may go to jail. It is not about politics, it is about murder, and the gross violation of criminal law. To invoke Executive Driveler means that the President, no one else, part took of personal discussion or received written documents related to very narrowly defined topics: military secrets, diplomatic secrets, or national security secrets, which must remain hidden for the good of the nation. Communications below his level do not qualify. He is obligated to define his basis of decision in the claim.
This was a huge move, the King may become in check.
I still do not comprehend why very smart people did what they did. Why give 20,000 weapons to killers? Why ignore the fury of Congress, border agents, and millions of Americans? My sole guesstimate is either breath taking arrogance, or gross incompetency.
If I am correct; this will now end Obama’s Presidency, and high level DoJ lawyers will go to jail. But why? For what? An rerun of the useless assault weapons ban? If true, they are too dumb to tie their shoes.
Strike “Driveler”, Insert “Privilege”
Apologies to all. Cant type.. Some may be, “……too dumb to tie their shoes.”
Oh, I don’t know.
“Driveler” doesn’t seem so out of place.
““I heard what he said, it was very clear. It was a fair and reasonable offer,” Cummings said, then launching into an attack on Issa for “partisan and highly inflammatory personal attacks” on Holder.”
You know, hearing this just makes me tired all over. If I were there, I’d say to Cummings, “Don’t you really care about a dead American border patrol agent and about 200 dead Mexicans? Aren’t you at least curious to know how it happened and how this insane opertion got so messed up? And, most of all, don’t you want to know who was responsible for all this? Or are you so blinded by party loyalties that you will forgive anything, even murder, if it will protect your man in office?”
These are the questions I would like to ask Cummings, not that he would ever, ever, answer them. The Department of Justice Inspector General has been looking at this case now for 18 months and has not made any progress and has not said a word. So, where Mr. Cummings do you want to go from here? Do you simply want this whole thing to just go away until the people forget about it? I bet you and that coward in the White House would like nothing better than that.
The Issa requested documents implicate the White House and Holder in spades. Now not only are they both up to their eyeballs in coverup, but both of these miscreants know they’re toast. Re-election is out of the question. And they know it. The SSObama is listing badly to the left. The list of ObamaPardons being made up as we speak will end up being as long as Obama’s list of lies to the American people. ObamaPardons will be in the thousands. Can Obama pardon himself? He will try. Or be tried for obstruction of justice in the Bill of Particulars. That smell of burning. It’s Obama. He’s toast. The only possible next term in the anointed one’s future is in Leavenworth.