By Allan Lengel
ticklethewire.com
WASHINGTON — The long awaited replacement of U.S. Attorneys around the country could begin soon. We’ll see how bi-partisan the selections are.
Josh Gerstein of Politico reports that Atty. Gen Eric Holder told the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday:
“I expect that we’ll have an announcement in the next couple of weeks with regard to our first batch of U.S attorneys.
“One of the things that we didn’t want to do was to disrupt the continuity of the offices and pull people out of positions where we thought there might be a danger that that might have on the continuity–the effectiveness of the offices.
“But…elections matter–it is our intention to have the U.S. Attorneys that are selected by President Obama in place as quickly as they can.”
So far, for sure, the only Republican appointed U.S. Attorney who is staying on is Patrick Fitzgerald of Chicago. That was a no brainer. Jim Letten of New Orleans has a pretty good shot at sticking around.
After that, who knows. U.S. Atty. Mary Beth Buchanan of Pittsburgh would like to stay. But that may be pushing the bi-partisan spirit a little too far considering her super-conservative credentials and ties to the Bush administration.
Some lawmakers are getting antsy about the issue.
Gerstein reports that Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) at Thursday’s hearing remarked: “Many jurisdictions are waiting desperately to see what is going to be done. As we understand it, the protocol has been that U.S. Attorneys would hand in their resignations and would give the new administration an opportunity to make new appointments, we don’t see that happening quite fast enough.”
