John David Ashcroft (born May 9 1942) is an
American politician who was the 79th United States Attorney General. He served during the first term of President George W. Bush from 2001 until 2005.
Ashcroft was previously the Governor of Missouri (1985 – 1993) and a
U.S. Senator from Missouri (1995 – 2001). He is
the author of several books, including: On My Honor: The Beliefs that Shape My Life, Lessons from a Father to his
Son, and most recently, Never Again: Securing America and Restoring Justice.
Early career: lawyer, governor
Ashcroft was born in Chicago to James Robert Ashcroft, a president of
Evangel University, and Grace P. Larsen, whose parents were immigrants from
Norway.[1] As a child he
had very serious glaucoma.[citation needed] His father was a minister in an Assembly of God congregation. Ashcroft was educated in Springfield, Missouri, and at Yale University, where he
graduated in 1964. He received a J.D. degree from the University of Chicago in 1967, and briefly taught business
law and worked as an administrator at Missouri State University (then
Southwest Missouri State University). Ashcroft is also a member of Sigma Tau Gamma
Fraternity
As a political neophyte in 1972, Ashcroft ran for Congress in Southwest Missouri. Ashcroft narrowly lost the Republican
primary to Gene Taylor, who went on to hold the seat for 16 years. After the primary, Governor Christopher Bond appointed Ashcroft as state auditor, the office Bond had vacated to assume the
governorship.
In 1974 Ashcroft was narrowly defeated by Jackson County Executive George W.
Lehr, who argued that Ashcroft, who was not an accountant, was not qualified to serve as state auditor. Jack Danforth, who was then in his second term as state attorney general, hired Ashcroft as an assistant
Missouri attorney general. During his tenure as assistant AG, Ashcroft shared an office suite with future Supreme Court justice
Clarence Thomas; and it would be his old friend, Justice Thomas, who would eventually
administer Ashcroft's oath of office as US attorney general in 2001.
In 1976 Danforth was elected to his first of three terms in the US Senate, and Ashcroft was elected to replace him as attorney
general. Ashcroft was re-elected in 1980, and was elected governor in 1984. In 1988, Ashcroft became the first (and, to date, the
only) Republican elected to consecutive gubernatorial terms in Missouri history. During his second term, from 1991 to 1992,
Ashcroft served as Chairman of the National Governors Association.
As Senator and Governor, Ashcroft helped enact tougher standards and sentencing for gun crimes, increased funding for local
law enforcement, and tougher standards and punishment for people bringing guns into schools. While Ashcroft was in office:
- The number of full-time law enforcement officers in Missouri increased 3,825 (63%) from 1985 to 1992.
- Capacity at Missouri corrections facilities increased by 72% from 9,071 in 1985 to 15,630 in 1993.
- Missouri was above average in the length of time criminals had to serve for all sentences according to Gail Hughes, deputy
director for the state Corrections Department, citing the 1991 yearbook published by the Criminal
Justice Institute. The national average for time served for all crimes was 23.7 months, while in Missouri the average
length of a sentence was 28.9 months.
- According to the U.S. Department of Justice, prison time as a percentage of the time sentenced to jail was 73% in 1993 and
increased to 86% in 1997.
- The number of juveniles who were arrested for committing a crime increased by 16.3% between from 1985 and 1992.
- While Ashcroft was governor, Missouri enacted its first hate crimes legislation, creating penalties for ethnic intimidation
and crimes committed for motives based on race, color, religion, or national origin, and penalties for institutional vandalism
for damages to ethnically-related buildings and property.
- While Ashcroft was governor, the legislature enacted the Missouri Victim's Bill of Rights, which allows crime victims to be
informed of and present at criminal proceedings, the right to restitution, the right to protection from the defendant and the
right to be informed of the escape or release of a defendant.
U.S. Senator
In 1994 Ashcroft was elected to the U.S. Senate from Missouri, again succeeding
a retiring John Danforth. Ashcroft won 60% of the vote against Democratic Congressman
Alan Wheat. As Senator:
- He was a leading opponent of the Clinton Administration's
Clipper encryption restrictions.
- He voted to prohibit those convicted of felony or misdemeanor domestic violence from owning a firearm.
- He convened the first and only Senate hearing on racial profiling, on March 30, 2000, with Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI), where he stated that racial profiling is unconstitutional and said that he supported
the concept of legislation requiring that statistics be kept of police actions.
- In 1999, as chair of the Senate's subcommittee on patents, he played a pivotal role in extending patents for several drugs,
most significantly Schering-Plough's allergy medication Claritin.[2]
- In 2000, he became the first Senate incumbent ever defeated for re-election by a dead man's name on the ballot (it was
understood that Mel Carnahan's wife, Jean Carnahan,
would assume the position if he won election).
2000 reelection campaign
In 1998, Ashcroft briefly considered running for president, but on January 5, 1999, he announced that he would not seek the
presidency and would instead defend his Senate seat in his 2000 reelection.[3]
In his bid for reelection to the Senate, Ashcroft faced a challenge from then-Governor Mel
Carnahan. Carnahan died in an airplane crash two weeks prior to the November general election, but his name remained on
the ballot due to Missouri state election laws. Lieutenant Governor Roger Wilson became
Governor upon Carnahan's death. Wilson announced that should Carnahan be elected he would appoint his widow, Jean Carnahan, to serve in her husband's place; Mrs. Carnahan agreed to this arrangement. Ashcroft
suspended all campaigning after the plane crash in light of the tragedy.
Voters elected Mel Carnahan, although dead, by a narrow margin. No one had ever posthumously won election to the Senate,
though voters on at least three occasions chose deceased candidates for the House.
This loss was despite having a larger budget than Carnahan that included controversial contributions from corporations such as
Monsanto (headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri),
which contributed five times more to Ashcroft than to any other congressional hopeful at the time.
Council of Conservative Citizens connections
During the 2000 Senate campaign, Ashcroft met with Thomas Bugel, local president of the
Council of Conservative Citizens (based in Missouri), to discuss the
case of Dr. Charles T. Sell, a St. Louis dentist and
CCC member indicted for several crimes including plotting to murder an FBI agent and a federal
witness. Ashcroft subsequently wrote to the federal Justice Department on Sell's behalf. Following Ashcroft's nomination for
federal attorney general and the subsequent public exposure of that meeting and letter, Ashcroft's spokeswoman Mindy Tucker asserted that he had not known that Bugel was associated with the CCC; this despite his having
had extensive previous contact with Bugel between 1987 and 1993, when Bugel had been a member of the St. Louis school board
vociferously defending segregation, and Ashcroft had been attorney general and
governor of Missouri who sided with Bugel. During that period, Bugel's leadership of the local branch of the CCC, the
Metro South Citizens Council, was often noted in the media.[4]
Ashcroft had previously denounced the CCC as racist, after a controversial interview in
Southern Partisan magazine in which he expressed views that were widely interpreted as
pro-Confederacy.
U.S. Attorney General
Following his Senatorial defeat, Ashcroft was nominated as U.S. Attorney
General by president-elect George W. Bush
in December 2000. Ashcroft was confirmed by the Senate by a vote of 58-42, with most of the Democratic Senators voting against
him, alleging previous opposition to desegregation and legal abortion.
Religion and conservatism
Ashcroft, a fervent lifelong member of the Assemblies of God church, has brought
the denomination more mainstream recognition than any of its earlier conspicuous congregants, including, Elvis Presley, Jimmy Swaggart, Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker and former Reagan administration
Interior Secretary James Watt [citation needed]. In his book Lessons From a Father to His Son (1998), Ashcroft
writes of his anointing himself in the manner of Biblical kings, before both terms as Missouri
Governor, using Crisco cooking oil when no holy oil was available.[5]
The former senator famously once boasted of his conservatism, saying that there are two
things you find in the middle of the road: "a moderate and a dead skunk", adding that he did not wish to be either [citation needed].
Anti-terrorism
After the September 11, 2001 attacks, Ashcroft was a key supporter of
passage of the USA Patriot Act. One of the provisions in that Act was the controversial
Section 215, which allows for warrant-less seizures of patron records from libraries and seizure of bookstore customer records.
Ashcroft referred to American Library Association opposition to Section 215
as "hysteria" in two separate speeches given in September, 2003.[6][7] During his tenure at
Justice, Ashcroft consistently denied that the FBI or any other law enforcement agency had used the Patriot Act to obtain library
circulation records or those of retail sales.
Ashcroft's positions on privacy and civil liberties issues made him an extremely
disliked figure by rightist libertarian as well as left-wing and liberal groups. Groups opposed
to the Bush administration often mentioned him as epitomizing all the reasons for their opposition. Some of his most prominent
critics were organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union and
pro-choice groups. Opponents claimed that Ashcroft used the threat of terrorism to further political goals. Examples cited include:
- In July 2002, Ashcroft proposed the creation of Operation TIPS, a domestic program in
which workers and government employees would inform law enforcement agencies about suspicious
behavior they encounter while performing their duties. The program was criticized in the media as an encroachment upon the First and Fourth Amendments, and the United States Postal
Service balked at the program, refusing outright to participate. Ashcroft defended the program as a necessary component of
the ongoing War on Terrorism, but the proposal was eventually abandoned.
- Ashcroft was responsible for draft legislation — the Domestic
Security Enhancement Act of 2003, which proposed to greatly expand the powers of the U.S. government to fight crime and
terrorism, while simultaneously eliminating or curtailing judicial review of these powers for incidents involving domestic
terrorism. The bill was leaked and posted to the Internet on February 7, 2003.
- On May 26, 2004, Ashcroft held a news conference at which he said that intelligence from multiple sources indicated that
al Qaeda intended to attack the United States in the coming months. [1] Critics said this was an
attempt to distract attention from a drop in the approval ratings of President Bush, who was campaigning for re-election.
Drug sentencing
Ashcroft was an enthusiastic advocate of the War on Drugs.[8] In a 2001 interview on Larry King Live, Ashcroft announced his intent to escalate
efforts in this area.[9] His tough-on-marijuana stance
dates back to his tenure as a Senator, when he successfully pushed for stricter federal mandatory sentencing laws for drug offenses. He continued this stance as the Governor of Missouri,
favoring a drug control policy that focused law enforcement efforts on casual drug
users.
In 2003, Ashcroft and the acting DEA Administrator, John B. Brown, announced a series of indictments resulting from two nationwide investigations
code-named Operation Pipe Dream and
Operation Headhunter. The investigations targeted
businesses selling drug paraphernalia, mostly marijuana pipes and bongs, under a
little-used statute (Title 21, Section 863(a) of the U.S. Code[10]). Counterculture icon
Tommy Chong was one of those charged, for his part in financing and promoting Chong
Glass/Nice Dreams, a company started by his son Paris. Of the 55 individuals charged as a result of the operations, only Chong
was given a prison sentence (nine months in a federal jail, plus forfeiting $103,000 and a year of probation). The other 54
individuals were given fines and home detentions. While the DOJ denied that Chong was treated any differently from the other
defendants, many felt that he was made an example of by the government. Chong's experience as a target of Ashcroft's sting
operation is the subject of the feature length documentary a/k/a Tommy Chong, which premiered at the 2005 Toronto International Film Festival.
Warrantless wiretap program
In March 2004, Ashcroft entered the George Washington Medical Center with gallstone
pancreatitis; surgeons removed his gallbladder (cholecystectomy) within a week. While he was in hospital, and seriously ill, on the evening of
March 10, 2004, White House
Counsel Alberto Gonzalez and White
House Chief of Staff Andrew Card went to his hospital room and allegedly requested
that Ashcroft reconsider the refusal of Acting Attorney General James Comey to
reauthorize the secret surveillance program, in contradiction
of the policy agreed by Ashcroft and Comey immediately before he fell ill. Comey had rushed to Ashcroft's room upon being
notified that Gonzalez and Card were on their way, and arrived shortly before them. Comey testified about this incident to the
Senate Judiciary Committee on May 15, 2007, during the committee's investigation of the controversial dismissal of U.S. attorneys in December of 2006. According to Comey's testimony,
Ashcroft refused to reauthorize the program and indicated that the acting Attorney General sitting next to the bed was the person
to whom Gonzales and Card should direct their request. Card and Gonzales allegedly turned and left the room at that point without
acknowledging Mr. Comey. According to notes from FBI Director Robert Mueller, Ashcroft
was "feeble, barely articulate, and clearly stressed" following the ordeal.[11]
Gonzales has contradicted Comey's account of the events. He stated: "Clearly if he (Ashcroft) had been competent and
understood the facts and had been inclined to do so, yes we would have asked him. Andy Card and I didn't press him. We said
'Thank you' and we left."[12]
As many as 30 Department of Justice senior staff were prepared to resign immediately, protesting both the underhanded effort
to go around acting A.G. Comey to get the program re-authorized, and also in protest of the Bush Administration's effort to
continue the warrantless search program without change, contrary to the DOJ's then current assessment of the program's lack of
legal basis.[13][14][15][16][17][18] Ashcroft has been requested to appear before House and Senate Intelligence
Committees in a closed-door hearing, in June 2007, to describe the incident, and circumstances surrounding the program more
completely.[19]
Other
In January 2002, the partially nude female statue of the Spirit of Justice,
which stands in the Great Hall of the Justice Department, where Ashcroft held press
conferences, was covered with blue curtains, along with its male counterpart, the Majesty of Law. It was speculated
this change was made because Ashcroft felt that reporters were photographing him with the
female statue in the background to make fun of his church's opposition to pornography. A
Justice Department spokeswoman said that Ashcroft knew nothing of the decision to spend $8,000 for the curtains; a spokesman said
the decision for permanent curtains was intended to save on the $2,000 per use rental costs of temporary curtains used for formal
events.[20] In late June 2005, Ashcroft's successor,
Alberto Gonzales, approved the removal of the curtains.
In February 2002, Ashcroft told the Los Angeles Times that in his opinion "Islam is a religion in which God requires
you to send your son to die for Him. Christianity is a faith in which God sends His son to die for you".[21]
Resignation
On November 9, 2004, Ashcroft announced his resignation from his post as Attorney General,[22] which took effect on February 3, 2005 with the Senate confirmation of White House Counsel
Alberto Gonzales as the next Attorney General.[23] Some believe his health was a factor in his decision. His hand-written
resignation letter, dated November 2, stated: "The objective of securing the safety of Americans from crime and terror has been
achieved."[24]
Consultant and lobbyist
Former US Attorney General John Ashcroft holds a press conference near
Sacramento.
In May 2005, Ashcroft laid the groundwork for a strategic consulting firm that bears his name. The Ashcroft Group, LLC[25] officially opened its doors in the Fall of 2005 and as of March 2006 had lined up 21 clients,
turning down two for every one accepted.[26]
In 2005 year-end filings, Ashcroft's firm reported collecting $269,000, including $220,000 from Oracle Corporation, which won Department of
Justice approval of a multibillion-dollar acquisition less than a month after hiring Ashcroft. The income totals that
Ashcroft has reported so far represent in some cases only initial payments.
According to government filings, Oracle is one of the Ashcroft Group’s five clients that seek his help in selling data or
software with homeland security applications. Another client, Israel Aircraft Industries
International, is competing with Chicago's Boeing Company to sell the government of South
Korea a billion-dollar airborne radar system. [9] The Ashcroft Group is also registered to represent ChoicePoint, eBay, Exegy, Alanco Technologies, LTU Technologies and TrafficLand, Inc.[27]
In March 2006, the New York Times reported that Ashcroft was setting himself up as something of an
"anti-Abramoff", and that in an hour long interview, Ashcroft used the word
integrity scores of times.[28]. In May 2006, based
on conversations with members of Congress, key aides and lobbyists, The Hill magazine listed Ashcroft as one of top 50
"hired guns" that K Street had to offer.[29] In August 2006, the Washington Post reported that Ashcroft's firm had 30
clients, many of which made products or technology aimed at homeland security, and about a third of which the firm has not
disclosed, to protect client confidentiality. The firm also had equity stakes in eight client companies. It reported receiving
$1.4 million in lobbying fees in the past six months, a small fraction of its total earnings.[30]
CIA leak conflict of interest allegation
-
When Karl Rove was being questioned by the FBI over the leak of a covert CIA agent's identity in the
press, Ashcroft was allegedly briefed about the investigation. Democrat U.S. Representative John Conyers described this, and many other acts of Republicans as a "stunning ethical breach that cries
out for an immediate investigation."[31] Conyers, the
ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, sent a letter asking for a formal investigation of the time between the start
of Rove's investigation and John Ashcroft's recusal.[32]
Singer-songwriter
Ashcroft composed a paean called "Let the Eagle
Soar" which he sang at the Gordon-Conwell Theological
Seminary in February 2002. The rendition was satirically featured in Michael Moore's 2004 movie Fahrenheit 9/11 and has been
frequently mocked by comedians such as David Letterman and Jon Stewart. The song was also sung at Bush's 2005 inauguration by Guy
Hovis, former cast member of The Lawrence Welk Show. Ashcroft has
penned and sung a number of other songs and created compilation tapes, including In the Spirit of Life and Liberty and
Gospel (Music) According to John.
With fellow Senators Trent Lott, Larry Craig, and
James Jeffords, he formed a barbershop quartet
called The Singing Senators.
Sometime in the 1970s, Ashcroft recorded a gospel record entitled TRUTH: Volume One,
Edition One with Missouri legislator Max Bacon, a Democrat.[33]
Academia
While Attorney General of Missouri, Ashcroft and his wife, wrote a textbook entitled College Law for Business.
On March 18, 2005, Regent University, a primarily graduate university founded by
Pat Robertson with its main campus in Virginia
Beach, Virginia, announced that Ashcroft would join the school's faculty on July 1. He now serves jointly in Regent's law
and government schools.[34]
Offered services to Satellite Radio
Ashcroft sent a letter on February 27, 2007 to his
successor, Alberto Gonzales, criticizing the proposed merger of Sirius Satellite
Radio Inc. and XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc. He approached XM in the days
after the merger was announced, offering the firm his consulting services, according to spokesman for XM.[35] The spokesman said XM declined Ashcroft's offer to work as a lobbyist for
the company. Ashcroft was subsequently hired by the National Association
of Broadcasters, which is fiercely opposed to the merger. On its behalf, he conducted a review of the effects on
competition if the two satellite radio companies were allowed to merge. In his letter to Gonzales on February 27, Ashcroft
concluded the merger would have a significant negative impact on competition in the market and urged the current attorney general
to withhold approval for the merger.[36]
Footnotes
- ^ http://www.wargs.com/political/ashcroft.html
- ^ http://archive.salon.com/politics/feature/2001/01/16/hearings/print.html
- ^ http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/stories/1999/01/05/president.2000/ashcroft/
- ^ http://archive.salon.com/news/col/cona/2001/01/16/ashcroft/
- ^ http://www.guardian.co.uk/bush/story/0,7369,661458,00.html
- ^ http://www.usdoj.gov/archive/ag/speeches/2003/091503nationalrestaurant.htm
- ^ http://www.usdoj.gov/archive/ag/speeches/2003/091803memphisremarks.htm
- ^ http://www.mapinc.org/newscsdp/v01/n228/a04.html
- ^ http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0102/07/lkl.00.html
- ^ http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=browse_usc&docid=Cite:+21USC863
- ^ "Ashcroft was 'feeble,
stressed' after Gonzales spy-plan meeting", August 16, 2007.
- ^ "Gonzales explains
bedside meeting with ailing Ashcroft", July 24, 2007.
- ^ http://gulcfac.typepad.com/georgetown_university_law/files/comey.transcript.pdf
- ^ Isikoff, Michael,
Evan Thomas. "Bush's
Monica Problem: Gonzales, the president's lawyer and Texas buddy, is twisting slowly in the wind, facing a vote of no confidence
from the Senate", Newsweek, The Washington Post Company, June 4, 2007. Retrieved on 2007-05-29.
- ^ "Mr.
Comey's Tale: A standoff at a hospital bedside speaks volumes about Attorney General Gonzales.", Washington Post, May
16, 2006, pp. A14. Retrieved on 2007-05-25.
- ^ Eggen, Dan, Amy Goldstein. "No-Confidence Vote Sought on Gonzales", Washington Post, May 18, 2007, pp. A03. Retrieved on 2007-05-25.
- ^ Congressional
Quarterly. "Transcript: Senate Judiciary Hearing Senate Hearing on U.S. Attorney Firings (Transcript, Part 1
of 5)", Washington Post, May 15, 2007. Retrieved on 2007-05-25.
- ^ Lichtblau, Eric. "Bush Defends Spy Program and Denies Misleading Public", New York Times, January
2, 2006. Retrieved on 2007-05-25.
- ^ Isikoff, Michael.
"Calling John
Ashcroft", Newsweek, The Washington Post Company, June 1, 2007, pp. (web exclusive). Retrieved on 2007-06-04.
- ^ http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/1788845.stm
- ^ Morse, Rob. "The gospel according to John (Ashcroft)", San Francisco
Chronicle, February 22, 2002, p. A-2. “Last month, he angered Muslims when he allegedly said that
Christianity is a faith in which God sends his son to die for you," while Islam is "a religion in which God requires you to send
your son to die for him."”
- ^ http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/11/09/cabinet.resignations/index.html
- ^ http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4485080
- ^ http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6446686/
- ^ The Ashcroft Group, LLC website
- ^ http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=FB0712FC35550C748DDDAA0894DE404482
- ^ United States Senate Office of Public Records
- ^ http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=FB0712FC35550C748DDDAA0894DE404482
- ^ "The
sharpest shooters on K Street" The Hill, May 3, 2006
- ^ "Ashcroft Finds Private-Sector Niche," Page 2, Washington Post, August 12, 2006
- ^ http://www.pacifica.org/programs/dn/050818.html
- ^ http://mediamatters.org/static/audio/podcast/trupianoshow_20050817.mp3
- ^ http://www.whitehouse.org/media/ashcroft-bacon/
- ^ http://www.regent.edu/news/_press_releases/march_2005/ashcroft.cfm
- ^ Boles, Corey. "Ashcroft Offered His
Services to XM Before Being Hired by NAB, XM Says", The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved on 2007-07-26.
- ^ http://today.reuters.com/news/default.aspx
References
- Mintz, John and Allen, Mike. "To Suspicious Candidates, the Threat of Attack Is No Longer Above the Fray."
The Washington Post, June 27, 2004.
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