Security

Justice Dept. Hunt for Rovian E-Mails Produces Lone Result

The Justice Department told Congress on Wednesday that it had unearthed only one e-mail between Karl Rove and senior Justice officials about the firing of U.S. attorneys. In responding — a day late — to a Senate Judiciary subpoena, Richard Hertling, a deputy assistant AG at Justice, sent a letter (.pdf) to Sen. Pat Leahy […]

The Justice Department told Congress on Wednesday that it had unearthed only one e-mail between Karl Rove and senior Justice officials about the firing of U.S. attorneys. In responding -- a day late -- to a Senate Judiciary subpoena, Richard Hertling, a deputy assistant AG at Justice, sent aletter (.pdf) to Sen. Pat Leahy (D-Vermont) detailing the results of his department's internal investigation, which went hunting for various handles Karl Rove may have used in e-mails with the department ("Rove, Karl, kr, gwb43.com, georgewbush.com, and rnchq.org"). Sixteen "custodians" had their e-mail archives searched for Rovian e-mail. All that turned up, according to Justice, was one message from Feb. 28, 2007 discussing a scandal that was already breaking.

Here's the strongly worded letter (.pdf) Leahy sent to Gonzales on Tuesday upbraiding him for failing to meet the subpoena deadline. A choice passage:

"You ignored the subpoena, did not come forward today, did not produce the, documents and did not even offer an explanation for your noncompliance. Your action today is in defiance of the Committee's subpoena without explanation of any legal basis for doing so."