April 29, 2007 07:26 AM UTC

DOJ: Partisan Hiring as well as Firing

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• by: Aristotle

In light on the DOJ partisan purge of attorneys deemed too independent, a controversial hiring process instituted by former AG John Ashcroft is being halted.

From the Washington Post: Political Appointees No Longer to Pick Justice Interns

The Justice Department is removing political appointees from the hiring process for rookie lawyers and summer interns, amid allegations that the Bush administration had rigged the programs in favor of candidates with connections to conservative or Republican groups, according to documents and officials.

The decision, outlined in an internal memo distributed Thursday, returns control of the Attorney General’s Honors Program and the Summer Law Intern Program to career lawyers in the department after four years during which political appointees directed the process.

The changes come as the Justice Department is scrutinized for its hiring and firing practices because of the dismissal of eight U.S. attorneys. Some of the fired prosecutors were removed because they were not considered “loyal Bushies” by senior Justice and White House officials.

Justice officials said the change was prompted by a contentious staff meeting in early December, which included complaints that political appointees led by Michael J. Elston, chief of staff for Deputy Attorney General Paul J. McNulty, had rejected an unusually large number of applicants during the most recent hiring period. Last year, about 400 applicants were interviewed for the honors program — the primary path to a Justice Department job for new lawyers — down from more than 600 the year before.

The House and Senate Judiciary committees also are investigating allegations from an anonymous group of Justice employees that most of those cut from the application lists had worked for Democrats or liberal causes and that Elston removed people for spurious reasons that included “inappropriate information about them on the Internet.”

The article goes on from there, discussing how Ashcroft shifted the hiring process away from career DOJ employees to himself and other political appointees, and gives specific examples of the kind of questions asked in interviews.

I won’t say this is typical of the Republicans (Nixon, Reagan, and the elder Bush certainly never engaged in this kind of abuse of power), but it is typical of the current president who values loyalty over all else. His administration effectively is trying to make a single party government (not GOP but Bush Republicans only), and I wonder if the man would create a cult of personality if he could.

More revelations like this and you might as well hand the White House keys to the Democrats. They’ll own it for 20 years.

H/T to The Stranger.

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