The New York Times
January 8, 2010
By CHARLIE SAVAGE
President Obama will renominate Dawn Johnsen to lead the Justice Department’s powerful Office of Legal Counsel, along with his choices for five other jobs that the Senate did not act on last year, a White House official said Thursday.
Ms. Johnsen, an Indiana University law professor who served as acting head of the office in the Clinton administration, was approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee in March. But the full Senate never voted on her nomination.
The Office of Legal Counsel tells the president and other executive officials whether actions would be lawful. Officials who rely on its opinions are essentially safe from prosecution.
Once obscure, the office became controversial in the Bush administration when it secretly signed off on interrogation and surveillance policies that bypassed statutory and treaty restraints, citing sweeping theories of presidential power. Ms. Johnsen was an outspoken critic of those claims.
Full Story: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/08/us/politics/08nominate.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=print
No comments:
Post a Comment