Identity Politics Recruiting at Holder's Justice Dept.

Ever since PJ Media’s blockbuster Every Single One Series documented the radical partisan lawyers hired as career civil servants in the Obama DOJ, many have asked me how this is accomplished. One way is that only attorneys are hired who have resumes which have obvious ideological histories. The Every Single One series provided the public copies of these resumes. They are filled with cues that were used in the hiring process to exclude some and include others.

But Eric Holder is also personally furthering the cause of ideological hiring. One way Holder is accomplishing this goal is by recruiting from within identity politics organizations. PJ Media has obtained an announcement from the DOJ internal intranet stating:

“On August 23rd Attorney General Eric Holder deliverred [sic] remarks at the annual Lavender Law Conference in Washington D.C. The conference marked this year’s largest minority recruiting event in the nation, bringing together hundreds of legal practitioners and law students from across the country.

The event included multiple representatives from the Department of Justice, including five U.S. Attorneys, who were introduced by the Attorney General as ‘strong LGBT allies: Melinda Haag, from the Northern District of California; David Hickton, from the Western District of Pennsylvania; Amanda Marshall, from the District of Oregon; Steve Wiggington, from the Southern District of Illinois; and Robert Pitman, from the Western District of Texas.”

Here is the program for the Lavender Law conference Holder attended. Some events included “Building a Queer-Friendly Legal Academy: Accomplishments and the Road Ahead – Sponsored by Patton Boggs LLP,” “Religion-based Arguments Against Legal Protections for LGBT People” and “LGBT Issues from an African-American Lens – Sponsored by Greenberg Trauig LLP.” Notable is the pervasive sponsorship of the event by large law firms.

Let’s get something straight, pun unintended: there is nothing wrong with hiring gay lawyers. The better question is whether the government should be actively recruiting people based on involvement in an identity politics group. Rest assured, there is no discrimination within the DOJ toward gay, black, or for that matter, transgender lawyers. So the standard excuse that pervasive discrimination demands such steps does not apply here. (See also the in-house version of Lavender Law, DOJ Pride.)

AAG Tom Perez and Holder at a DOJ Pride event. (DOJ photo).

Other high level Department of Justice officials have attended events from other left-leaning organizations to recruit. Each year the Civil Rights Division sends lawyers to other conferences  around the country, such as the NAACP conference, to recruit lawyers and law students.  These identity politics recruitment efforts have the intentional effect of funneling particular sorts of applicants toward DOJ jobs. Be assured that Holder and his gang aren’t recruiting at conferences sponsored by the NRA. So the ideological hiring program at Holder’s DOJ is done through recruitment at identity politics organizations combined with hiring people who include involvement with ideologically correct groups on their resumes.