Justice Department Under Ongoing Scrutiny

FARAI CHIDEYA, host:

Our next headline takes us to another civil rights institution that's fallen on hard times, the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division. Last month, we spoke with Teresa Lynn, former analyst for the division for 33 years. She recently resigned saying managers hired attorneys based on their conservative politics and not the quality of their education or experience.

Well, on Tuesday, the Senate Judiciary Committee grilled Justice official Bradley Schlozman. He helped run the department's Civil Rights Division from 2003 to 2006. And Schlozman admitted that he had actively recruited attorneys from conservative groups like the Federalist Society. He also admitted boasting about hiring such staunch Republicans.

And for more, we're joined by David Goldstein. He's Washington correspondent for The Kansas City Star and McClatchy newspapers. And he sat in on Schlozman's testimony.

David, thanks for coming in.

Mr. DAVID GOLDSTEIN (Correspondent, The Kansas City Star): Thank you for having me.

CHIDEYA: So set the scene for us. The Democrats bombarded Schlozman with hostile questions. Did Republicans on the committee defend him?

Mr. GOLDSTEIN: No, because there were no Republicans who showed up. It was a Democratic free for all. Mr. Schlozman was there, largely, without a net.

CHIDEYA: So he helped run the Civil Rights Division from 2003 to 2006. What exactly did he admit to doing?

Mr. GOLDSTEIN: He said he was - he got several questions from the Democratic senators about what sort of considerations he came into play in terms of hiring? In the Justice Department, there's a difference between the career attorneys and the political appointees. And with the career attorneys, you have to follow Civil Service guidelines. You can't ask any types of political questions or qualifications. And he was asked whether loyalty, political affiliation, ideology, how they voted came into play. And he said it did not come into play at all for the career appointees.

But he did say, and he, in fact, boasted in a sense that he did - they did hire people that were conservatives and were Republicans and he boasted about the number of that he did hire. But he said he did not break any laws.

CHIDEYA: How exactly does this parse out, the difference between targeting people who have a certain ideology and not breaking these laws?

Mr. GOLDSTEIN: Well, I think it's probably a pretty fine line. I think they believe and Mr. Schlozman said that there were a number of questions that they asked but they never took the political types of questions into play. They didn't come into play at all for the career employees. And he was adamant about that, despite the number of questions that he was asked.

CHIDEYA: Now, Schlozman is also under fire because in 2006 he was taken out of the Civil Rights Division and made interim U.S. attorney for part of Missouri, including Kansas City. What did he do there that's gotten him into some hot water?

Mr. GOLDSTEIN: Well, what happened there was that it turns out that his predecessor as a U.S. attorney in Kansas City, Todd Graves, was under pressure as were a number of U.S. attorneys, as we've since learned, to pursue voter fraud cases. And there has been a lot of criticism about that because Democrats and other critics have accused the Bush Justice Department of using that as a way to undermine Democratic elections, undermine Democratic candidates in elections and boost Republicans.

And Graves was a not pursuing that. He got - he was basically told to leave in January of '06. Schlozman took his place. He was appointed by Attorney General Alberto Gonzales without any sort - he didn't have any trial experience at all, but he took the U.S. attorney's job. And what happened was, there - ACORN, which is a liberal activist group, had several - was registering voters for the '06 election and Missouri had a really close Senate race as several other states did. And he pursued a case against four ACORN workers. And ACORN workers said, fired, because they had fraudulently attained some voter registration from. And Schlozman right ahead and filed indictments against them.

And the problem was that there are Justice Department guidelines that forbid the Justice Department attorneys from filing any kind of voter fraud cases or election cases just before the election. And these indictments were filed within a week of this very close Senate race in Missouri, the Republican Party in Missouri that made a big deal about that.

CHIDEYA: Very interesting. And finally, does Schlozman's testimony advance this Justice story at all? This whole kerfuffle(ph) over whether or not there has been malfeasance in terms of the Civil Rights Division and by whom.

Mr. GOLDSTEIN: Well, I think it does advance it in a number of ways because his testimony follows the testimony a few weeks of Monica Goodling who was under with immunity, and she was a top official in the Justice Department. That she admitted that she did perhaps cross the line in a number of cases, in terms of hiring people for civil service jobs and taking political consideration into play. And, in addition, last week the Justice Department inspector general announced that they were now expanding their investigation of the U.S. attorney firings to look at allegations about politicized hiring practice at the Justice Department.

And on one other level, it advances. It gives Democrats more ammunition. I think they feel anytime that they can keep the White House off balanced, it's good for them. So there's a large political element here, too.

CHIDEYA: Well, David, thank you so much.

Mr. GOLDSTEIN: You're welcome. Thank you for having me.

CHIDEYA: David Goldstein is Washington Correspondent for the Kansas City star and McClatchy newspapers. And he joined us from NPR's Washington, D.C. headquarters.

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