Gonzales aides broke laws in hiring

Senior aides to former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales broke the law by using politics to guide their hiring decisions for a wide range of important department positions, slowing the hiring process at critical times and damaging the department's credibility and independence, an internal report concluded on July 28. The report, prepared by the Justice Department's inspector general and its internal ethics office, singles out for particular criticism Monica Goodling, a young lawyer from the Republican National Committee who rose quickly through the ranks of the department to become a top aide to Gonzales. Goodling introduced politics into the hiring process in a systematic way that constituted illegal misconduct, the report found. Last month, the inspector general, Glenn A. Fine, released a separate report that found a similar pattern of politicized hiring at the Justice Department in reviewing applications from young lawyers for the honors and intern programs. The new report goes much further, however, in documenting pervasive evidence of political hiring for some of the department's most senior career, apolitical positions, including immigration judges and assistant US attorneys. The inspector general's investigation found that Goodling and a handful of other senior aides to Gonzales developed a system of using in-person interviews and internet searches to screen out candidates who might be too liberal and to identify candidates seen as pro-Republican and supportive of President Bush. In her position as White House liaison for the Justice Department, Goodling was involved in hiring lawyers for both political appointments and non-political, career positions. Regardless of the type of position, the report said, Goodling would run through the same batch of questions, asking candidates about their political philosophies, why they wanted to serve President Bush, and who, aside from Bush, they admired as public servants. Sometimes, Goodling would ask: "Why are you a Republican?" Goodling also conducted extensive searches on the internet to glean the political or ideological leanings of candidates for career positions, the report found. She and other Justice Department supervisors would look for key phrases like "abortion," "homosexual," "guns," or "Florida re-count" to get information on a candidate's political leanings.