Welcome to Gonzales Watch - Blawging the Ex-Attorney General

The House Committee on the Judiciary authorized a grant of immunity today for Monica Goodling (inset), in exchange for testimony from Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’ former Senior Counsel and DOJ liasion to the White House.

A two-thirds vote by Committee members was required in order for immunity to be granted. 32 Committee members voted in favor of granting Goodling immunity, six voted against and two were not present.

The former senior Justice Department official was granted what is called “limited use immunity,” for testifying before a Congressional proceeding under 18 U.S.C. § 6005.

Legally speaking, the immunity isn’t automatic. The House General Counsel will need to go before a federal judge in the U.S. District Court to get an order that formally gives Goodling immunity.

As Attorney General, Gonzales could try to delay immunity for Goodling. Federal law allows the attorney general ask the court to “defer the issuance of any order” for “not longer than twenty days from the date of the request for such order.” That is done to give the DOJ an opporunity to advise Committee whether or not giving Goodling immunity would interfere with any ongoing or expected criminal investigation that she may have been involved with at the Department.

Gonzales continues to maintain that he’s done “nothing improper” in firing the career prosecutors, despite the bipartisan bashing he received at last week’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing.

President Bush continues to say that Gonzales has his full support, telling reporters after the hearing that he’s “an honest, honorable man, in whom I have confidence.”

It appears that the President must have seen a different recording of last week’s Judiciary Committee hearing than the rest of the country. Bush said that when Gonzales testified, he “answered every question he could possibly answer, honestly answer, in a way that increased my confidence in his ability to do the job.” Did he hear the 64 or 70+ times that Gonzales said he could not recall specifics of his participation in, and knowledge of, the process of firing U.S. Attorneys? Apparently not.

Why Goodling’s Testimony Could Be Imporant
Goodling was present at the Nov. 27, 2007 meeting in the Attorney General’s conference room where Gonzales and his most senior aides met to discuss the planned firings of U.S. Attorneys.

The House and Senate Judiciary Committee repeatedly sought Goodling’s sworn testimony in its investigation of the U.S. Attorney firings controversy.

This is a huge victory for Goodling’s lawyerJohn Dowd, a noted D.C. white collar criminal defense attorney. He’s repeatedly invoked his client’s Fifth Amendment right not to testify.

Earlier, he slammed Senate and House Judiciary Committee member tactics, saying that they smacked of McCarthyism by assuming that his client was hiding something, when under the Constitution, she is presumed innocent of any wrongdoing.