Welcome to Gonzales Watch - Blawging the Ex-Attorney General

Peter Keisler, the head of the Justice Department’s Civil Division under Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, gave 2-weeks notice today that he’s resigning.

Keisler is one of three Bush appointees who were accused by Sharon Y. Eubanks, the DOJ’s former lead tobacco racketeering prosecution lawyer of interfering with the government’s prosecution of the case against Big Tobacco.

According to an account that Eubanks gave the Washington Post, Keisler and two other Bush appointees only took an interest in her team’s civil racketeering case against tobacco companies “when it became clear that the government might win.”

Before being appointed by Bush, Keilser was a litigator at Sidley Austin, LLP, and served as Assistant Counsel and then Associate Counsel in the White House under former President Ronald Reagan.

Keisler was nominated by President Bush to be a federal appellate judge at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit is still pending.

Given the allegations made against him by Eubanks concerning the huge penalty changes in the government’s settlement with tobacco companies — the $130B in civil penalties were reduced to just $10B after Keisler and his colleagues reportedly made Eubanks rewrite her closing arguments — his nomination is sure to be hotly contested before the Senate Judiciary Committee.