"The attorney general's appointment authority has not and will not be used to circumvent the confirmation process," McNulty told the Democrat-led panel. "We never have and never will seek to remove a United States attorney to interfere with an ongoing investigation or prosecution or in retaliation for a prosecution."
McNulty spoke after weeks of accusations by Democrats that the forced resignations of prosecutors in Arkansas and California in particular were moves to reward Republican allies.
Democrats and Republicans blamed the situation on a little-known provision slipped into the Patriot Act reauthorization that took effect in March, letting the attorney general replace prosecutors indefinitely. They now are seeking legislation to give interim appointment authority to District Court judges, with a deadline by which the prosecutor must be confirmed by the Senate.
Judges often are not qualified to make those appointments, Gonzales said last month.
The hearing, chaired by Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York, gave lawmakers a new chance to insist that the Justice Department has used that provision to appoint political allies to US attorney offices.
In Arkansas, H.E. Bud Cummins received a call from a Justice Department official last year telling him to resign and assuring him there was no cause for the firing, a fact McNulty confirmed yesterday. Cummins's replacement was to be J. Timothy Griffin, a former aide to presidential counselor Karl Rove and a former military prosecutor.
Also angering Democrats is the case of former US attorney Carol Lam of San Diego, whose pursuit of public corruption cases included the government's case against Randy "Duke" Cunningham, the former Republican congressman who pleaded guilty to taking $2.4 million in bribes.
McNulty denied Lam was fired in retaliation for Cunningham's conviction, calling Lam's pursuit of the case "a very good thing for the American people and the Department of Justice to accomplish."
"We are proud of that accomplishment," McNulty said.
