White House Stonewalls Firings Probe

President Bush ordered his former White House counsel, Harriet Miers, to defy a congressional subpoena and refuse to testify Thursday before a House panel investigating U.S. attorney firings.

"Ms. Miers has absolute immunity from compelled congressional testimony as to matters occurring while she was a senior adviser to the president," White House Counsel Fred Fielding wrote in a letter to Miers' lawyer, George T. Manning.

Manning, in turn, notified committee chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., that Miers would not show up Thursday to answer questions about the White House role in the firings of eight federal prosecutors over the winter.

Conyers, who had previously said he would consider pursuing criminal contempt citations against anyone who defied his committee' subpoenas, revealed the letters after former White House political director Sara Taylor testified Wednesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Conyers said of Miers, Mr. Bush's former White House lawyer, "As a former public official and officer of the court, Ms. Miers should be especially aware of the need to respect legal process, and we expect her to appear before the committee tomorrow as scheduled."

Fielding said the Justice Department had advised the White House that Miers had absolute immunity from compelled congressional testimony.

"The president has directed her not to appear at the House Judiciary Committee hearing on Thursday, July 12, 2007," Fielding wrote.

Taylor told senators she never talked to President Bush about the firing of U.S. Attorneys and doesn't think he had anything to do with the decisions, but she wouldn't answer most of the panel's specific questions, citing the president's directive not to, reports CBS News' Bob Fuss.

"I did not attend any meetings with the president where that matter was discussed," Taylor said under stern questioning by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy.

When asked more broadly whether Mr. Bush was involved in any way in the firings, Taylor said, "I don't have any knowledge that he was."

Taylor, who left the White House eight weeks ago for reasons she said were unrelated to the firings, was treading a rough line between obeying Mr. Bush's order not to reveal internal White House deliberations and responding to a congressional subpoena compelling her to do so. Her lawyer, Neil Eggleston, sat at the witness table to advise her.

"I'm trying to be consistent and perhaps have not done a great job of that," Taylor said. "I have tried."

The committee's ranking Republican, Sen. Arlen Specter, said that may not be enough to protect her from a contempt citation for failing to answer many of the committee's questions.

"There's no way you can come out a winner," said Specter, R-Pa. "You might have been on safer legal ground if you'd said absolutely nothing."

As for the prospects of pursuing a criminal citation for contempt of Congress, Leahy said only, "That's a decision yet to be made."

The exchange was part of proceedings that were as much about the ongoing dispute over what information the White House can keep secret as it was about the stated topic — the firings over the winter of eight U.S. attorneys.

Loyal to Mr. Bush even outside the White House, Taylor said she was trying not to answer questions that might violate the president's claim of executive privilege. At one point she reminded the committee that as a commissioned officer, "I took an oath and I take that oath to the president very seriously."

Seeing a chance to weaken Taylor's observance of Mr. Bush's executive privilege claim, Leahy corrected her: She took an oath to uphold the Constitution, he said.

"Your oath is not to uphold the president," Leahy lectured her.

Taylor began by telling the committee she would observe Mr. Bush's directive to defy the subpoena and refuse to answer questions covered by executive privilege, unless a court ordered her to do so.

Democrats insisted that the decision to cooperate — or not — with the subpoena was hers.

"It is apparent that this White House is contemptuous of the Congress and feels that it does not have to explain itself to anybody," Leahy, D-Vt., said as he opened the hearing. "I urge Ms. Taylor not to follow that contemptuous position and not to follow the White House down this path."

With that, Democrats began to try to unravel Taylor's adherence to Mr. Bush's directions and prod her into answering their questions about who ordered the firings and why.

Democrats noted that Taylor, 32, is a private citizen compelled by subpoena to testify, under threat of being held in contempt of Congress. During a first round of questioning, Leahy asked Taylor repeatedly whether she had met with or talked to Mr. Bush about the replacement of U.S. attorneys. Taylor repeatedly refused to answer, citing Mr. Bush's instructions.

She got some backup — at first — from Specter.

"I think your declining to answer the last series of questions by the chairman was correct under the direction from White House counsel," Specter said.

"Whether White House counsel is correct on the assertion of executive privilege is a matter which will be decided by the courts," Specter added. But, in the senator's view, "congressional oversight has the better of the argument."

Some lawmakers said Taylor's decision to answer some questions weakened Mr. Bush's executive privilege claim.

"I think sometimes you've stepped on one side of the line and then not wanted to step on the other," said Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. "This broad claim of privilege doesn't stand up."

Apart from her comments about Mr. Bush, Taylor revealed a few other details: She said she did not recall ordering the addition or deletion of names to the list of prosecutors to be fired. Taylor said she had no knowledge that Mr. Bush was involved in the planning of whom to fire, an assertion that echoed previous statements by Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, his former chief of staff Kyle Sampson and Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty.

Taylor disputed Sampson's account that she wanted to avoid submitting a new prosecutor, Tim Griffin, through Senate confirmation.

"I expected him to go through Senate confirmation," Taylor said under questioning by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.

Taylor also issued a stiff defense of her colleagues in the Bush administration.

"I don't believe there was any wrongdoing by anybody," she said.

Democrats said the same standard applied to a second former Bush aide, one-time White House counsel Harriet Miers. Miers, subpoenaed to appear before the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday, said through her lawyer that she "cannot provide the documents and testimony that the committee seeks."