DOJ

Attacks leveled by conservatives against Department of Justice (DOJ) attorneys who provided legal representation to military detainees before joining the government continue to reverberate with lawyers, including many with ACS affiliations, have countered the tactics in newspaper op-ed pages across the country. The attacks triggered by Sen. Charles Grassley's criticism of the DOJ attorneys have been fueled by Liz Cheney's group called Keep America Safe.

In a Chicago Tribune column published today, Seattle attorney Harry H. Schneider Jr. and Chicago attorney Thomas P. Sullivan lambasted Cheney's Keep America Safe group for producing an inflammatory YouTube video tagging the DOJ the "Department of Jihad," and the attorneys the "Al Qaeda Seven."

Schneider and Sullivan write:

It is hard to imagine a more reckless charge. Well, on second thought, we can think of one. Her video is reminiscent of similar tactics used during one of the darker episodes in American history, when Sen. Joseph McCarthy charged that those who insisted on due process for anyone he accused must be a Communist sympathizer or a closet enemy of the U.S.

The two defend the DOJ attorneys' previous work on behalf of military detainees, writing:

Our constitutional system requires that we afford due process to defendants even in times of genuine threat to our nation and attacks on our people. The courts depend on the willingness of lawyers to represent those accused of crimes, although their clients may be feared or hated. We have long since accepted that a lawyer who is acting as counsel for a person accused of a crime does not make the lawyer a criminal.

In an op-ed piece for the Boston Globe, Sabin Willet, an attorney with Bingham McCutchen, who has represented military detainees, wrote, "Some Americans will see the rule of law as a threat, and lawyers as the enemy. Small men with loud voices will exploit their fears on cable television. Petty politicians will mine them for votes."

Dawn Johnsen's nomination to lead the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) was delayed again by the Senate Judiciary Committee this morning. Johnsen, a former member of the ACS Board of Directors, was first announced as President Obama's OLC nomination in January 2009. After prior support of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Johnsen's nomination spent the better part of 2009 -- a year of unprecedented obstruction -- languishing on the Senate floor without a vote.

The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal published editorials today staking out opposing views on Johnsen's nomination. This battle of the editorial boards follows last week's Los Angeles Times editorial stating that "the obstruction of this nomination is and always has been unjustified."

The Journal's editorial criticized Johnsen for her views on the OLC's role under the Bush administration, when that office produced the infamous "torture memos," noting: 

During the Bush years she [Johnsen] has said that OLC gave "horrific legal advice" and "advice premised on an extreme and unfounded view of presidential power to justify desired counter terrorism policies." On issues such as the use of domestic electronic surveillance or interrogation policies, she has called the Bush Administration's practices controversial and "sometimes flatly illegal."

Considering these same facts, The Times editorial called Johnsen "a highly qualified choice" whose nomination has drawn "baseless objections" causing "unreasonable delay."