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Rove Deputy to Leave White House
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ShareOctober 04, 2007 4:42 PM
ABC News' Theresa Cook and Jennifer Duck Report: A top White House aide who was embroiled in the U.S. attorney firings scandal has resigned his post effective Friday, ABC News has learned.
Emails released by the Justice Department earlier this year show J. Scott Jennings, who served as a deputy to departed senior White House political advisor Karl Rove, communicated regularly with other White House and Justice Department officials regarding the dismissals of at least nine U.S. attorneys last year.
A local report from Jennings' home state of Kentucky indicates that he will leave the White House to work for a public relations firm in that state.
Jennings had appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee in August as part of the ongoing Congressional investigation into the prosecutor firings.
During that hearing, however, Jennings repeatedly invoked executive privilege and declined to answer the lawmakers' questions. His boss at the time, Rove, did not comply a subpoena to appear at that same hearing, also citing executive privilege.
The executive privilege issue set up a summer showdown that pitted the Bush administration against Congress.
Congressional committees had issued subpoenas for both documents and testimony from numerous current and former White House employees and the Republican National Committee, but White House counsel Fred Fielding asserted executive privilege for those involved.
The Senate Judiciary Committee’s chairman, Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., had indicated that the confirmation process of Michael Mukasey, the nominee chosen to replace former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, could be slowed down because of what Leahy has repeatedly called “stonewalling” by the White House.
On Thursday, however, Leahy issued a statement suggesting that the confirmation hearings could start as soon as Oct. 17, though he noted that Mukasey would be asked about the ongoing controversies.
"Regrettably the White House has chosen not to clear the decks of ongoing concerns and not to produce the information and material they should have and could have about the ongoing scandals that have shaken the Department and led to the exodus of its former leadership," Leahy said in a statement.
"Those matters now encumber the Mukasey nomination and, as he knows, he will be asked about them."
October 4, 2007 | Permalink | User Comments (1)
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Another fly fleeing the stinking ship! Just more executive coverup!
Posted by: Bec67 | Oct 8, 2007 11:18:57 AM
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