Resignation deals blow to Gonzales - No. 2 official in department to quit

Resignation deals blow to Gonzales - No. 2 official in department to quit
By Andrew Zajac
Copyright © 2007, Chicago Tribune
Published May 15, 2007


WASHINGTON -- Paul McNulty, the Justice Department's No. 2 lawyer, whose congressional testimony in February fueled the uproar over the firing of at least eight U.S. attorneys, announced his resignation Monday, becoming the fourth senior department official to quit during the festering controversy.

McNulty's departure as the department's day-to-day manager was widely expected but nonetheless represents a blow to the leadership of Atty. Gen. Alberto Gonzales, who has been battling for weeks to keep his job in the face of demands for his resignation by lawmakers from both parties.

McNulty, the highest ranking apparent casualty of the scandal, announced his resignation at a meeting of U.S. attorneys in San Antonio.

In a letter to Gonzales, McNulty, 49, said he was stepping down because "the financial realities of college-age children and two decades of public service lead me to a long overdue transition in my career."

But McNulty was closely tied to the firing scandal in part because he oversees the office that manages U.S. attorneys and in part because his congressional testimony managed to inflame lawmakers, several of the fired prosecutors and Gonzales.

McNulty's testimony that one of the fired prosecutors, Bud Cummins of Arkansas, had done nothing wrong but was dismissed to make room for a protege of White House adviser Karl Rove fed congressional suspicions that politics, perhaps to an unethical or illegal degree, drove the sackings.

That admission irked Gonzales, who had to defend his department against charges of White House meddling.

McNulty also told lawmakers that the other prosecutors were fired for poor performance, prompting several of them to publicly assert that they had been given excellent job reviews and had not been told why they were being let go.

The testimony by McNulty and other Justice officials is under investigation by departmental watchdogs that want to know if the statements deceived Congress.

Gonzales has acknowledged that the firings were bungled, but he has steadfastly insisted that they were proper and based on job-related shortcomings.

In a statement, Gonzales praised McNulty as "a dynamic and thoughtful leader."

In his resignation letter, McNulty said he would stay on until late summer.

Unlike Gonzales, whose ties to President Bush stretch back more than a decade to Texas, McNulty was not a member of the White House inner circle, but he boasted strong conservative Republican credentials.

He served as a top staff lawyer to House Republicans for 12 years and was the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia from mid-September 2001 until March 2006, when he was confirmed as deputy attorney general, a post he also held on an acting basis beginning in November 2005.

Congressional Democrats signaled that they would not be placated by McNulty's departure.

"Another resignation won't make the unanswered questions about the fired U.S. attorneys disappear," Rep. Rahm Emmanuel (D-Ill.) said in a statement.

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azajac@tribune.com

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Another domino



Deputy Atty. Gen. Paul McNulty joins three other key Justice Department officials who have resigned since the uproar over U.S. attorney firings erupted. The others:

*Kyle Sampson, Atty. Gen. Alberto Gonzales' chief of staff, resigned in March and later told senators that Gonzales was more directly involved in the firings than he had acknowledged.

*Monica Goodling, White House liaison, left in April. She refused to testify before Congress but has been offered immunity.

*Mike Battle, former head of the office that oversees federal prosecutors, said he left in March for reasons unrelated to the controversy.