Inspector general to look into racial preference system at Justice

The other shoe is dropping on the stonewallers at the Obama Justice Department. Yesterday, the department's inspector general, Glenn A. Fine, informed Rep. Lamar Smith, Texas Republican, and Rep. Frank Wolf, Virginia Republican, that he will open "a review of the enforcement of civil rights laws by the Voting Rights Section of the Department's Civil Rights Division." Such an investigation is bound to kick up a lot of dirt.

Although the review won't directly or solely analyze the now-infamous decision to deep-six a voter-intimidation case against members of the New Black Panther Party, it could include that case within its broader analysis of "whether the Voting Section has enforced the civil rights laws in a non-discriminatory manner; and whether any Voting Section employees have been harassed for participating in the investigation or prosecution of particular matters." This is big stuff. It would be difficult not to find something shady in Justice's decision not to pursue a case in which a Black Panther wielded a nightstick at a voting place while he and another spit violently racist epithets at voters.

For months, Mr. Wolf implored Mr. Fine to investigate the Black Panther scandal. For months, Mr. Fine said it was out of his jurisdiction. Yet it turns out that while he claims no legal authority to review a specific prosecutorial decision, the inspector general asserts he may by law "conduct the broader program review."

This is the same sort of review, from outside the department, that the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights has been attempting, despite an utter and lawless lack of cooperation from Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. The poignant point about Mr. Fine's change of heart is that the New Black Panther case was never merely about two menacing thugs standing outside a single polling place. The overdue need for an investigation centers on the broader question of whether the Obama-Holder Justice Department enforces civil rights laws equally in defense of whites and Asians as it does on behalf of blacks or Hispanics. Ample anecdotal and strong circumstantial evidence indicates it doesn't.

Mr. Fine's investigation and an upcoming report from the Civil Rights Commission amount to a one-two punch against racial preferences at Justice. Between the two efforts, the American public can muster hope for a forced return to equal justice under the law.

Examiner to Justice: "stop stonewalling" on voter intimidation

On Election Day 2008, three members of the New Black Panther Party were captured on tape at a Philadelphia polling place attempting to intimidate voters. All three wore military attire and one wielded a nightstick. The Justice Department, in the last days of President George W. Bush’s presidency, brought a voter intimidation case against the trio, which the department won by default. Then President Obama’s political appointees in the Justice Department got involved. Without even reading the memoranda connected to the case, they forced its dismissal after it was already won. Justice dropped the case against two of the defendants and settled with the third, requiring him only to refrain from carrying a “deadly weapon” near a Philadelphia polling place until 2012.

The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights has attempted to investigate the dismissal, only to meet resistance from Obama’s Department of Justice at every turn. J. Christian Adams, a career attorney in Justice’s voting rights section, testified before the commission last month, but only after resigning his position due to “the corrupt nature of the dismissal, statements [by Obama appointees] falsely characterizing the case, and most of all, indefensible orders for the career attorneys not to comply with lawful subpoenas investigating the dismissal.” Justice is now blocking another career attorney at Justice, Christopher Coates, from testifying on the case. Coates, who led the Justice Department’s voting rights section, reportedly objected to dismissal of the case, at which point he was removed from his post and transferred to South Carolina.

This case matters. What’s at stake is the fair and honest administration of justice, something the Obama administration seems to regard all too lightly. If, as Adams testified, Obama’s Justice Department consciously ignores voting rights violations allegedly committed by minorities, that is a big deal. We need transparency now, to restore faith in government. We need to hear from Coates and others about why such clear-cut wrongdoing only merited dismissals and a wrist-slap.

Thomas Perez, Obama’s appointee to head the Civil Rights division at Justice, is apparently so busy suing Arizona law enforcement and blocking Ivy League colleges from using the Amazon Kindle that he doesn’t think flagrant violations of the laws protecting voters are worth his time. Obama should get his priorities in line, embrace transparency in this case, and stop stonewalling a legitimate investigation into Justice Department corruption.

At Justice, they lose sleep as the debt soars - because of a Mardi Gras party, a film festival, a carnival, dancing, a fashion show...

A new oversight report released yesterday by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) exposes millions of dollars in Department of Justice (DOJ) funds are being spent on parties.

The review of recent activities sponsored by DOJ grantees identified luaus, a Mardi Gras party, block parties, a film festival, a carnival, skateboarding, dancing, fashion shows, and even a doughnut eating contest among the recreational activities made possible with federal crime prevention funding.

“With our nation facing the heightened threats of domestic terrorism and unprecedented debt and financial challenges, taxpayers should be shocked to learn DOJ crime prevention grant programs are paying for parties and rollercoaster rides for children rather than focusing on investigating crimes, locating and prosecuting terrorists, and administering justice,” Coburn said.

Coburn's scathing, 42-page report entitled “Party at the DOJ” comes amid new Government Accountability Office (GAO) findings that DOJ does not track amounts spent on recreational activities nor does it assess impact outcomes of these expenditures.

“With America facing the threat of domestic terrorism and a $13 trillion debt, the Department of Justice parties on the taxpayers’ dime,” the new oversight report states.

From the Executive Summary:

Americans woke up to news of a car bomb in New York‘s Times Square and a national debt surpassing $13 trillion in May.

At the same time, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) was preparing for a “Fun Day” celebration in Texas, a luau in Tennessee, and other parties and fun activities across the country.

Justice stonewalls congress on Black Panther intimidation

For more than a year, I have been urging the U.S. Department of Justice to release all the documents surrounding the dismissal of U.S. v. New Black Panther Party and to make a genuine attempt to answer the questions asked by members of Congress and the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights about the case. My requests have been rebuffed at each turn by the department.

As a strong supporter of the Voting Rights Act, I was deeply troubled by Justice's questionable dismissal of such an important voter intimidation case in Philadelphia, where I grew up and my father was a policeman.

My commitment to voting rights is unquestioned. In 1981, I was the only member—Republican or Democrat—of the Virginia delegation in the U.S. House of Representatives to vote for the Voting Rights Act and was harshly criticized then by the editorial page of the Richmond Times Dispatch, the state's leading newspaper. I was criticized, too, in 2006 by another newspaper in my district when I supported the act's reauthorization.

From the beginning, I have asked the question: why did the Justice Department dismiss this serious case? If this is not a clear case of voter intimidation, I do not know what is.

This case was brought in January 2009 by career attorneys in the department's Civil Rights Division against the New Black Panther Party and several of its members—one of whom brandished a nightstick—for deploying uniformed men to a polling station in Philadelphia on Election Day November 2008 to harass and intimidate voters.

One of the witnesses of the Election Day incident—Bartle Bull—a veteran civil rights activist who served as Bobby Kennedy's New York campaign manager in 1968, has publicly called this "the most blatant form of voter intimidation" he has ever seen.

Justice Department practices race-conscious civil rights law

...the Obama administration doesn’t believe some civil rights laws protect every American. The Bush Civil Rights Division was willing to protect all Americans from racial discrimination; during the Obama years, the Holder years, only some Americans will be protected. Americans have a right to know and judge the racial policies of the administration they elected in 2008.

The dismissal of the voter intimidation lawsuit against armed New Black Panthers in Philadelphia is the most prominent example of this hostility toward race-neutral enforcement of civil rights laws. But that dismissal is far from the only manifestation of the beliefs infesting the Department. Many other cases and decisions — some of which I will detail below — are in question and deserve scrutiny.

On Election Day 2008, armed men wearing the uniforms and jackboots of the New Black Panther Party were posted in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, at the entrance to a polling site. They brandished a weapon and intimidated voters. After the election, the Civil Rights Division at the U.S. Department of Justice brought a voter intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party and these armed thugs. I, and other Justice lawyers, obtained an entry of default after the defendants ignored the case against them.

Before a final judgment could be entered, however, our superiors ordered dismissal of the claims.

Congress has sought answers from the Department about why the Black Panther case was dismissed. The Department has repeatedly claimed the “facts and law” did not support the case — which of course is false. Others have speculated about a White House involvement. But I believe the best explanation for the corrupt dismissal of the case is the profound hostility by the Obama Civil Rights Division in the Justice Department towards a race-neutral enforcement of civil rights laws.

This hostility was — and is — on open display within the Department of Justice.

Eric Holder: Nine Obama appointees in Justice Department have reresented terrorist detainees

Attorney General Eric Holder says nine Obama appointees in the Justice Department have represented or advocated for terrorist detainees before joining the Justice Department. But he does not reveal any names beyond the two officials whose work has already been publicly reported. And all the lawyers, according to Holder, are eligible to work on general detainee matters, even if there are specific parts of some cases they cannot be involved in.

Holder's admission comes in the form of an answer to a question posed last November by Republican Sen. Charles Grassley. Noting that one Obama appointee, Principal Deputy Solicitor General Neal Katyal, formerly represented Osama bin Laden's driver, and another appointee, Jennifer Daskal, previously advocated for detainees at Human Rights Watch, Grassley asked Holder to give the Senate Judiciary Committee "the names of political appointees in your department who represent detainees or who work for organizations advocating on their behalf…the cases or projects that these appointees work with respect to detainee prior to joining the Justice Department…and the cases or projects relating to detainees that have worked on since joining the Justice Department."

In his response, Holder has given Grassley almost nothing. He says nine Obama political appointees at the Justice Department have advocated on behalf of detainees, but did not identify any of the nine other than the two, Katyal and Daskal, whose names Grassley already knew. "To the best of our knowledge," Holder writes,

During their employment prior to joining the government, only five of the lawyers who serve as political appointees in those components represented detainees, and four others either contributed to amicus briefs in detainee-related cases or were otherwise involved in advocacy on behalf of detainees.

Holder says other Obama appointees, like Holder himself, came from law firms which represented detainees but did no work on behalf of the terrorist prisoners.