Bush's Nominee for No. 2 Justice Post Withdraws

October 8, 2005
Bush's Nominee for No. 2 Justice Post Withdraws
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
New York Times

President Bush's pick for the second-ranking position at the Justice Department abruptly withdrew his nomination Friday after facing weeks of questions over his ties to the lobbyist Jack Abramoff as well as his role in formulating policies for the treatment of suspected terrorists.

The nominee, Timothy Flanigan, a former deputy White House counsel who is now a senior lawyer at Tyco International, had been scheduled to face yet another round of questioning next week from senators who had grown skeptical about his nomination as deputy attorney general.

With the stalled nomination likely to drag on for weeks or longer, Mr. Flanigan told President Bush in his withdrawal letter on Friday that the president and Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales "deserve to have a full leadership team in place at the Department of Justice."

Of chief concern to Democrats and some Republicans was Mr. Flanigan's role at Tyco, where as its general counsel he oversaw Mr. Abramoff's work lobbying for the company, which is based in Bermuda, to retain its tax-exempt status. Critics of the nomination said they were also troubled by the fact that Mr. Flanigan had no experience as a criminal prosecutor and that he helped shape administration policy on the treatment of suspected terrorists in American custody, as deputy White House counsel under Mr. Gonzales.

Mr. Flanigan becomes the most prominent Bush appointee to pull his nomination since Bernard B. Kerik withdrew from consideration as homeland security secretary last December. In the end, Mr. Flanigan's nomination appears to have been scuttled by a convergence of disparate issues that have all proven increasingly difficult for the Bush administration: charges of cronyism in political appointees, the wide-ranging investigation into Mr. Abramoff's political lobbying work, and lingering concern about the administration's allowance of the questionable treatment of suspected terrorists.

"Rather than appointing professionals with relevant experience, the Bush administration has promoted a culture of cronyism by tapping political allies and close friends for key positions," Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, said in a written statement issued after Mr. Flanigan announced his withdrawal.

"Like Mike Brown at FEMA, Timothy Flanigan has strong credentials as a faithful Republican Party stalwart," he said. "But just as Mr. Brown did not have the qualifications to lead our nation's primary disaster response agency, there were serious doubts about Mr. Flanigan's qualifications to serve as the nation's second-highest ranking law enforcement officer."

Mr. Flanigan is a prominent member of the Federalist Society, a group of conservative legal scholars. Within the administration and the conservative community, his withdrawal spoke less to his credentials and more to the realization that anyone associated with Mr. Abramoff risks political fallout.

"Tim had a passing connection to Abramoff that's now spawned all these rounds of questions about someone who's had an impressive career, and there's certainly some frustration over that within the department," said a senior Justice Department official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the issue involved internal department discussions.

Mr. Flanigan, who officials at Tyco said would remain as general counsel there, did not return calls for comment Friday. But officials at the White House and the Justice Department said the decision to withdraw his nomination was his alone.

With the deputy attorney general post vacant for the last several months after the departure of James B. Comey, Mr. Flanigan "felt that the situation had left the attorney general without a number two for too long, especially after the London bombings, and that was becoming of great concern to Tim," the senior Justice Department official said.

Theodore B. Olson, a longtime associate of Mr. Flanigan's who worked with him on behalf of Mr. Bush in the battle over the 2000 Florida election recount, said "this is frustrating for the administration, and it's too bad for the Justice Department, because the deputy attorney general is a very, very important person over there and really keeps the department running."

Mr. Bush nominated Mr. Flanigan for the deputy attorney general post 4½ months ago. The pick generated little controversy at first. But Mr. Flanigan faced persistent questions, first in an August hearing and then in four rounds of written, follow-up questions from Democrats - about both his oversight of Mr. Abramoff and his role in formulating detainees policies.

Democrats said they were still unsatisfied with some of his answers and demanded more time to review his record, particularly the question of why Tyco and Mr. Flanigan failed to detect that Mr. Abramoff had diverted for his use some $1.5 million paid by Tyco for what was to have been a grass-roots lobbying campaign. Senate Democrats were also continuing to probe other aspects of Mr. Flanigan's relationship with Mr. Abramoff, who gave the Tyco executive a $250 picture frame for Christmas one year.

Republicans on the judiciary committee sought to have a second hearing behind closed doors to deal with the issues concerning Tyco and Mr. Abramoff, but Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, chairman of the committee, agreed Thursday to hold another public hearing next week.

Senator Richard Durbin, Democrat of Illinois, who had pressed Mr. Flanigan repeatedly about the Tyco questions , said in an interview that he "was shocked" by Mr. Flanigan's decision to withdraw, but he speculated that the administration had grown weary of questions about Mr. Abramoff and a top-ranking nominee.

The withdrawal of Mr. Flanigan's nomination came on the same day that a former White House official tied to Mr. Abramoff made his first appearance in court to answer charges of obstruction of justice in connection with the case.

David H. Safavian, who served as the head of the White House's office of procurement until just before his arrest last month in the Abramoff investigation, did not enter a plea in federal court. But his lawyer, Barbara Van Gelder, offered a detailed preview of her client's defense after the hearing, telling reporters that prosecutors have "stretched the limits of the criminal code" in prosecuting him.

An indictment returned against Mr. Safavian on Wednesday charged that he lied to investigators about his contacts with Mr. Abramoff when he denied that the lobbyist had business before the General Services Administration, where Mr. Safavian was chief of staff from 2002 to 2004. E-mail messages traded between the two men at the time showed that Mr. Safavian was trying to help the lobbyists acquire two government-owned properties.

Ms. Van Gelder said her client answered investigators truthfully, since Mr. Abramoff had only made inquiries about the properties and did not in fact have "business" before his office. And she said that prosecutors were simply trying to "leverage" their case against Mr. Abramoff by pressuring Mr. Safavian to cooperate in the case against him.

As for a golfing trip to Scotland that Mr. Safavian took with Mr. Abramoff in 2002, the defense lawyer said Mr. Safavian saw it as strictly a personal trip, not professional. "A man wanted to go golfing with his friends," she said. "It was all about golf."