WASHINGTON—Alberto Gonzales has always been there for George W. Bush.
The U.S. attorney general has been the president's "go-to guy" dating to their days in Austin, Tex., there to protect Bush from publicity over a drunk-driving conviction, making his death penalty decisions easier, giving his administration the wiggle room it sought in dealing harshly with prisoners in the war on terror, advocating greater presidential power.
Gonzales earned his stripes again at hearings in perhaps his most arduous day as the boss's surrogate, defending Bush's right to eavesdrop on conversations involving Americans without seeking court approval.
Here's a look at a number of times Gonzales has ridden to Bush's rescue since 1994, when he became general counsel to then-governor Bush in Texas:
- 1994-1997: More than 50 times, Gonzales provided confidential clemency reports to Bush, who had the power to commute sentences of Texas death row inmates.
None was ever granted clemency, and an investigation by The Atlantic Monthly in 2003 concluded Gonzales routinely ignored mitigating factors such as inept legal counsel, conflicts of evidence and evidence of innocence. According to Democratic Senator Russell Feingold of Wisconsin, one Gonzales memo failed to mention that the lawyer of one condemned man fell asleep during his trial. - 1996: When governor Bush was summoned for jury duty, Gonzales was said to have sprung into action to argue he should be excused because of a conflict — the governor had the power to ultimately pardon the accused.
But it appears a bigger issue was at play. Bush was being asked to sit on a jury trying an Austin stripper on drunk-driving charges and would have had to reveal his own 1976 drunk-driving conviction.
That remained secret until the eve of the 2000 election. Gonzales denied the story under oath during his 2005 Washington confirmation hearings, but Newsweek magazine reported he made the conflict argument in secret in judge's chambers. Gonzales said he recalled no such meeting. - 2001: As Bush's legal counsel, Gonzales played a leading role in Bush's claim of unfettered wartime powers, allowing him to round up and seize "enemy combatants," ultimately rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court as an unjustified "blank cheque" for the president. That same year, he wrote the order establishing "military commissions" to try terrorist suspects, tribunals since widely derided as "kangaroo courts."
- 2002: Gonzales signed the infamous memo to Bush calling the Geneva Conventions "quaint" that did not apply to enemy combatants scooped off the battlefields of Afghanistan. He was also central in the August 2002, justice department memo — since repudiated by the government — asserting torture could be very narrowly defined and opening the door, many believe, to the abuses at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.
- 2004: Gonzales led the vetting process for Bush's chosen Homeland Security chief, Bernard Kerik. The former New York police chief withdrew his nomination within a week after it was learned, among other things, he had entertained women in a hotel room across from the World Trade Center set aside for exhausted police officers.
- 2005: At his attorney general confirmation hearing, Gonzales covered for Bush on the very question that brought him back to the committee yesterday.
When asked specifically whether the president could authorize warrantless wiretapping, Gonzales dismissed the question as hypothetical, even though the program had been in effect for about three years.
Feingold said yesterday Gonzales had purposely misled the committee. Gonzales said he answered truthfully when he said the president would not authorize something in contravention of criminal statutes.
