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Apr 13, 2007 10:49 pm US/Central
Paulose, Heffelfinger In Rating Documents
Minneapolis (AP) ―
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The Minnesota U.S. Attorney's Office experienced a revolt this month when three lawyers resigned from their top management posts.
CBS
Minnesota's past and present U.S. attorneys appear in a spreadsheet made public Friday by the U.S. Department of Justice that indicates they may have been rated based on their experience -- as well as whether they were members of a conservative law association called the Federalist Society.
The spreadsheet, among 2,394 pages of e-mails released as part of the congressional investigation into the firings of eight federal prosecutors, lists qualifications of all 124 U.S. attorneys nominated since 2001, including Minnesota's Rachel Paulose and her predecessor, Tom Heffelfinger.
The document was being touted by Democrats as evidence that the prosecutors' conservative credentials were important to the Justice Department. It contains columns for prosecution experience, political experience and judicial experience.
It also has a column for The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies, which was founded by conservative law students and now claims 35,000 members, including prominent members of the Bush administration, the federal judiciary and Congress.
Paulose was listed as "Yes." Heffelfinger, who said he resigned in February 2006 of his own accord, is listed without affiliation.
The spreadsheet is undated. It was attached to a Feb. 12, 2007 e-mail that Monica Goodling, who abruptly quit last week as top aide to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, sent to Justice Department spokesman John Nowacki.
The date of the e-mail is nearly a year after Heffelfinger announced he would resign.
"It doesn't mean anything as far as I'm concerned," Heffelfinger said Friday. "To the degree that it reports my background, it's accurate, though I think I've done more in my life than those checkmarks they had."
He said he had no comment on the Federalist Society column.
"I don't know why it's in there or what it means," said Heffelfinger, who is now in private practice.
A spokeswoman for Paulose, Jeanne Cooney, said her membership in the group lapsed Oct. 1, 2006 -- about two months after President Bush nominated her to the post but about two months before the U.S. Senate confirmed the nomination.
Paulose, who previously served as a top Justice Department counsel and special assistant to Gonzales, had no comment on the spreadsheet, other than to say she may join the Federalist Society again in the future, Cooney said.
The Minnesota U.S. Attorney's Office experienced a revolt this month when three lawyers resigned from their top management posts, amid questions about Paulose's management style and experience. Paulose, 34, has since apologized.
Earlier this week, freshman U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., wrote a letter to the Justice Department, urging it to inform Congress if it uncovers evidence that political pressure played a role in how the office in Minnesota is run. Klobuchar has also called for Gonzales to resign.
"I recognize the administration has the right to make their own appointments, but I disagree with using the criteria of whether or not someone is in the Federalist Society," Klobuchar said Friday.
(© 2007 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
