Republicans step up attacks on Eric Holder
Attorney General Eric Holder
/ File,AP Photo/Danny JohnstonUPDATED 2:51 p.m. ET
(CBS News) Republican lawmakers on Tuesday stepped up their attacks of Attorney General Eric Holder, with one senator calling for the controversial cabinet member to step down.
Texas Republican Sen. John Cornyn called on Holder to step down at a hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Holder was there to answer questions about the Obama administration's response to a report in the New York Times about U.S. efforts to curtail Iran's nuclear program.
The New York Times reported earlier this month that the United States is using computer warfare to attack Iran's nuclear program.
"You leave me no alternative but to join those that call upon you to resign your office. Americans deserve an attorney general who will be honest with them," Cornyn told Holder, citing the intelligence leaks to the New York Times and other issues including the scandal surrounding the department's controversial "Fast and Furious" program that allowed thousands of guns to get into the hands of Mexican drug cartels. Cornyn was one of only two senators on the panel who voted against Holder's initial confirmation to the post in 2009.
Holder fired back at Cornyn, telling him he had no intention of resigning."With all due respect, senator, there is so much that is factually wrong with the premises that you started your statement with, it's almost breathtaking in its inaccuracies," Holder said.
The attorney general has called on a pair of U.S. attorneys to look into the intelligence leaks.
Iowa Republican Sen. Charles Grassley criticized the decision to have U.S. attorneys, who are politically appointed, to look into the matter and said Holder should instead appoint an independent special prosecutor to head the probe to avoid any appearance of conflict of interest.
Holder called the two U.S. attorneys, Ron Machen and Rod Rosenstein, experienced and highly respected.
"They are good lawyers, they are tough prosecutors," Holder said.
Arizona Sen. John McCain, meanwhile, introduced a Senate resolution calling for the appointment of a special counsel to investigate the leaks.
"I can't think of any time that I have seen such breaches of ongoing national security programs as has been the case here," McCain said.
South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham said Holder did not understand the magnitude of the situation.
"I think you are missing the fact that this is a very big deal. And you are handling it in a way that creates suspicions where there should not be," Graham said as Alabama Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions said "these leaks could very well be criminal."
Separately, New York Republican Rep. Peter King, who chairs the House Committee on Homeland Security, said the leak is worse than Watergate scandal that brought down President Richard Nixon.
"It is far more important," King said in an interview with Fox News Radio, "to me, there is no comparison at all."
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Cornyn: "Ah know, we'll start the usual change the subject lie we RepubliCONs are world famous for. Worked for Dubya, it'll work for us."
Sessions and McCain: "Yeah, that's the ticket!"
They have no problem with lies getting us into Iraq which ran up deficits beyond belief, and they seemed to have forgotten W falling asleep at the wheel on 9/11.
Both parties are corrupt and beholden to the same powerful people in D.C. The republican party comes out and pretty much admits this and yet we still have idiots posting here defending them. I don't give Holder a pass on this, but holy cr@p, do you right wingers have one brain amongst the whole lot? What a bunch of knuckle dragging neanderthals.
Even in the brief news report I heard on the Senate hearing, it was clear what Eric Holder was saying; he said he'd release documents (like the 7,600 DOJ has already released), but NOT documents that would prevent DOJ from prosecuting cases currently in progress and NOT documents that would endanger informants. There's nothing new or strange or "socialist" about those limitations.
I don't know whether it's the NRA or Rush or Fox or World News Daily that's peddling the conspiracy theory that F&F was a secret plot to take away Americans' guns, but it IS a conspiracy theory and it's a FALSE conspiracy theory. Only the overweening narcissism of the radical right would make people think Barack Obama and Eric Holder and other very busy people don't have enough to do trying to govern the country and somehow have the time to sit around, plotting how to take their guns away. Talk about paranoia!
Biggest bunch of phony issues I have seen. I remeber the Plame investigation. What a boondoggle that turned into.
money buys everything just like republican politicians too!
AND kudos on the FLA suit as well.