A day after John Ashcroft resigned the post, President Bush named Alberto Gonzales U.S. Attorney General. Mr. Gonzales, if confirmed by the Senate, would be the first Hispanic to serve as the nation's top law enforcement officer.
President Bush and Mr. Gonzales have a long history of working together. From 1997 to 1999, Mr. Gonzales served as general counsel and secretary of state to Mr. Bush when he was the governor of Texas. In 1999, Bush appointed him to the Texas Supreme Court and in December 2000 he asked Mr. Gonzales to join him as the White House legal counsel.
The appointment of a high-level Hispanic cabinet officer has become a historic moment for the Latino community, especially after seeing that 44 percent of Hispanics voted for Bush. The National Council of La Raza, the country's largest Hispanic advocacy group, which has often criticized the administration, praised Bush for the appointment.
Bush said Wednesday that Gonzales would be "a steward of civil rights" as head of the Justice Department, while Gonzales said he's committed to "justice for every American." However, Gonzales's record has raised some significant doubts among Republicans, Democrats and advocacy groups alike.
As Governor Bush's counsel in Texas, Mr. Gonzales was in charge of reviewing all clemency requests on 57 death penalty cases. An article published in 2003 in the Atlantic Monthly alleged that Mr. Gonzales "repeatedly failed to apprise the governor of crucial issues in the cases at hand: ineffective counsel, conflict of interest, mitigating evidence, even actual evidence of innocence.” Mr. Bush allowed the executions to proceed in all but one of the 57 cases, including that of Terry Washington, a 33-year-old mentally retarded man with the communications skills of a seven-year-old. During Mr. Gonzales' term, the state of Texas executed more prisoners, and still has more prisoners on death row than any other state.
Although Mr. Gonzales possesses every major attribute Bush is expected to look for in an attorney general: personal loyalty, sharp political instincts, a strong view of presidential power, and counterterrorism credentials, Gonzales was one of the key White House advocates of detaining terrorism suspects indefinitely without formal charges. He strongly opposed allowing detainees access to counsel or the court system, a stance the Supreme Court essentially repudiated and which is now being fought out in the lower courts. Gonzales alleged that the Geneva Conventions did not apply to prisoners in the war on terrorism.
He also wrote a controversial Feb. 2002 memo in which Bush claimed the right to ignore international treaties prohibiting torture of prisoners. That position drew fire from human rights groups, which said it helped lead to the type of abuses uncovered in the Abu Ghraib prison scandal in Iraq and which have been alleged at Guantanamo Bay.
Jamie Fellner, head of the United States program at Human Rights Watch, said: "The elections did not hand President Bush a blank check to carry on as before. It is distressing that his first nominee post-election not only doesn't have a record of defending human rights but has a record of actively opposing their recognition."
Mr. Gonzales has also been at the centre of other high-profile disputes, including efforts to bar top White House officials from testifying before the commission that investigated the September 11 attacks, and the investigation into whether White House officials wrongly leaked the name of a CIA operative. Gonzales carries an impressive resume. In addition to the posts of Texas Supreme Court judge and Texas Secretary of State, he was Bush's chief adviser and liaison on Mexico and border issues. He was also an adjunct law professor and was named Lawyer of the Year by the Hispanic National Bar Association. Announcing Gonzales’ appointment to attorney general, Bush said, "The American people expect and deserve a Department of Justice guided by the rule of law, and there should be no question about the department's commitment to justice for every American. On this principle there can be no compromise."
Although his previous record in this Administration has raised a lot of doubts, he deserves to be given the benefit of the doubt. I truly hope that he means what he says about his "commitment to justice for every American." A good way of starting to achieve this justice would be by revising the constitutionality of the Patriot Act, the detentions in Guantanamo Bay, and the designation of U.S. citizens as enemy combatants.
Commentary Erika Robles
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