GOP Blocks Gonzales No-Confidence Vote

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales speaks at the National Press Club in Washington in this May 15, 2007 file photo. Majority Democrats in the Senate are forcing their Republican colleagues on the record about whether Gonzales should keep his job. The resolution, expected to be voted on Monday, is one sentence: "It is the sense of the Senate that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales no longer holds the confidence of the Senate and of the American people." (AP Photo/Ron Edmonds, File) (Ron Edmonds - AP)

"There is no confidence in the attorney general on this side of the aisle," said Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, the senior Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Specter voted to move the resolution forward, but he said many of his GOP colleagues would not because they feared political retribution.

Democrats said it was only fair to put senators on record for or against Gonzales, particularly since five GOP senators have called for the attorney general's resignation and many more have said they have lost confidence in him.

The mere debate shook loose another Republican call for a new attorney general.

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, for the first time publicly declared she had lost confidence in Gonzales.

"I think his continued tenure does not benefit the department or our country," she said.

Chief sponsor Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., urged more like her to vote their true feelings.

"If senators cast their vote with their conscience, they would speak with near unanimity that there is no confidence in the attorney general," said Schumer. "Their united voice would undoubtedly dislodge the attorney general from the post that he should no longer hold."

"He deserves to be fired," said Senate Majority leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.

Whatever Gonzales may or may not deserve, some Republicans said, it's not the Senate's job to hold forth on a member of the president's Cabinet.

"This is a nonbinding, irrelevant resolution proving what? Nothing," said Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss. "Maybe we should be considering a vote of no confidence on the Senate or on the Congress for malfunction and an inability to produce anything."

The vote cut across party lines.

Among the Republicans voted for the no-confidence resolution were four who had already called for a new attorney general: Sens. John Sununu of New Hampshire, Gordon Smith of Oregon, Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and Norm Coleman of Minnesota. Joining them were Specter and Maine Republicans Olympia Snowe and Collins.