Special Prosecutor Weighed for Gonzales

U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales addresses the National Sheriffs' Association during their annual convention Tuesday, June 26, 2007, in Salt Lake City. The return of Gonzales to the Senate Judiciary Committee is in some ways the story of Democratic failure to drum up enough pressure to force President Bush's hand. (AP Photo/Douglas C. Pizac) (Douglas C. Pizac - AP)

WASHINGTON -- Angry senators suggested a special prosecutor should investigate misconduct at the Justice Department, accusing Attorney General Alberto Gonzales on Tuesday of deceit on the prosecutor firings and President Bush's eavesdropping program.

Democrats and Republicans alike hammered Gonzales in four hours of testimony as he denied trying, as White House counsel in 2004, to push a hospitalized attorney general into approving a counterterror program that the Justice Department then viewed as illegal.

Gonzales, alternately appearing wearied and seething, vowed anew to remain in his job even as senators told him outright they believe he is unqualified to stay.

He would not answer numerous questions, including whether the Bush administration would bar its U.S. attorneys from pursuing contempt charges against current and former White House officials who have defied congressional subpoenas for their testimony.

"It's hard to see anything but a pattern of intentionally misleading Congress again and again," Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., told Gonzales during the often-bitter Senate Judiciary Committee hearing. "Shouldn't the attorney general of the United States meet a higher standard?"

"Obviously, there have been instances where I have not met that standard, and I've tried to correct that," Gonzales answered.

The hearing rekindled a political furor that began with last year's firings of nine U.S. attorneys and led to disclosure of a Justice Department hiring process that favored Republican loyalists. Gonzales has soldiered on with Bush's support, despite repeated calls for his resignation and questions about his role in a hospital room confrontation with then-Attorney General John Ashcroft over whether to renew a classified but potentially illegal national security program.

"Of course the president continues to have full confidence in the attorney general," White House spokesman Tony Fratto said after the hearing ended. "We have every reason to believe that the attorney general testified truthfully."

In one withering exchange, Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., noted a potential need for a special prosecutor to bring contempt citations against two White House officials who have refused to testify about the U.S. attorney firings. The House Judiciary Committee will vote Wednesday on the citations against Bush chief of staff Josh Bolten and former presidential counsel Harriet Miers.

Normally, the U.S. attorney in Washington would bring such criminal contempt cases to a federal grand jury for possible indictment and prosecution. But the Justice Department, in a letter sent to lawmakers Tuesday, said criminal contempt of Congress law "does not apply" to the president or his aides when they invoke executive privilege.

Despite repeated questions, Gonzales refused to say whether he would allow a presidentially appointed prosecutor to investigate White House aides who Bush has said are covered by executive privilege and therefore exempt from talking.

That leaves open the door for presidents to shut down the checks-and-balances of congressional oversight, Specter said.