Issa Statement on Bipartisan Vote Holding Attorney General in Contempt

Issa Statement on Bipartisan Vote Holding Attorney General in Contempt over Refusal to Produce Fast and Furious Documents

The U.S. House of Representatives has approved a resolution holding Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt of Congress over his refusal to produce Operation Fast and Furious documents subpoenaed last October.  The vote on H.Res. 711, making a finding of contempt, was approved by a vote of 255 to 67.  Seventeen Democrats crossed party lines to join the majority in the finding of contempt against Attorney General Eric Holder.  The House is also scheduled to vote later today on H.Res. 706, authorizing civil action in courts to compel production of subpoenaed documents.  House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa issued this statement following passage:

“Today, a bipartisan majority of the House of Representatives voted to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt for his continued refusal to produce relevant documents in the investigation of Operation Fast and Furious. This was not the outcome I had sought and it could have been avoided had Attorney General Holder actually produced the subpoenaed documents he said he could provide. 

“The Congressional inquiry into Operation Fast and Furious, and the cover-up by Justice Department officials of wrongdoing, has been a fair and fact based investigation.  False and partisan allegations by the White House and some congressional Democrats about the Oversight Committee’s efforts were undermined by the votes of 17 Democrats.  These Members resisted the pressure of their own leadership and the Obama Administration to support this investigation on the House floor.

“Claims by the Justice Department that it has fully cooperated with this investigation fall at odds with its conduct:  issuing false denials to Congress when senior officials clearly knew about gunwalking, directing witnesses not to answer entire categories of questions, retaliating against whistleblowers, and producing only 7,600 documents while withholding over 100,000.

“I greatly appreciate the ongoing efforts of Senator Chuck Grassley, his staff, and other Senators on the Judiciary Committee who have pressed the Obama Administration for the full truth.  Senator Grassley began this investigation and has been a full partner throughout it.  I must also recognize the hard work done by many of my colleagues here in the House – without their efforts the Justice Department’s stonewalling would have succeeded.  

“My message to my colleagues and others who have fought for answers:  We are still fighting for the truth and accountability – for the family of murdered Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, for whistleblowers who have faced retaliation, and for countless victims of Operation Fast and Furious in Mexico.  Unless President Obama relents to this bipartisan call for transparency and an end to the cover-up, our fight will move to the courts where we will prevail in getting the documents that the Justice Department and President Obama’s flawed assertion of executive privilege have denied the American people.”

Final Vote Results To Find Attorney General Holder In Contempt

FINAL VOTE RESULTS FOR ROLL CALL 441
(Republicans in roman; Democrats in italic; Independents underlined)
      H RES 711      RECORDED VOTE      28-Jun-2012      4:39 PM
      QUESTION:  On Agreeing to the Resolution
      BILL TITLE: Recommending that the House of Representatives find Eric H. Holder Jr., Attorney General, U.S. Department of Justice, in contempt of Congress for refusal to comply with a subpoena duly issued by the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform

	AYES	NOES	PRES	NV
REPUBLICAN	238	2		1
DEMOCRATIC	17	65	1	108
INDEPENDENT
TOTALS	255	67	1	109

---- AYES    255 ---

Adams Aderholt Akin Alexander Altmire Amash Amodei Austria Bachmann Bachus Barletta Barrow Bartlett Barton (TX) Bass (NH) Benishek Berg Biggert Bilbray Bilirakis Bishop (UT) Black Blackburn Bonner Bono Mack Boren Boswell Boustany Brady (TX) Brooks Broun (GA) Buchanan Bucshon Buerkle Burgess Burton (IN) Calvert Camp Campbell Canseco Cantor Capito Carter Cassidy Chabot Chaffetz Chandler Coble Coffman (CO) Cole Conaway Cravaack Crawford Crenshaw Critz Culberson Davis (KY) Denham Dent DesJarlais Diaz-Balart Dold Donnelly (IN) Dreier Duffy Duncan (SC) Duncan (TN) Ellmers Emerson Farenthold Fincher Fitzpatrick Flake Fleischmann Fleming Flores Forbes Fortenberry Foxx Franks (AZ) Frelinghuysen Gallegly Gardner Garrett Gerlach

Gibbs Gibson Gingrey (GA) Gohmert Goodlatte Gosar Gowdy Granger Graves (GA) Graves (MO) Griffin (AR) Griffith (VA) Grimm Guinta Guthrie Hall Hanna Harper Harris Hartzler Hastings (WA) Hayworth Heck Hensarling Herger Herrera Beutler Hochul Huelskamp Huizenga (MI) Hultgren Hunter Hurt Issa Jenkins Johnson (IL) Johnson (OH) Johnson, Sam Jones Jordan Kelly Kind King (IA) King (NY) Kingston Kinzinger (IL) Kissell Kline Labrador Lamborn Lance Landry Lankford Latham Latta LoBiondo Long Lucas Luetkemeyer Lummis Lungren, Daniel E. Mack Manzullo Marchant Marino Matheson McCarthy (CA) McCaul McClintock McCotter McHenry McIntyre McKeon McKinley McMorris Rodgers Meehan Mica Miller (FL) Miller (MI) Miller, Gary Mulvaney Murphy (PA) Myrick Neugebauer Noem Nugent

Nunes Nunnelee Olson Owens Palazzo Paul Paulsen Pearce Pence Peterson Petri Pitts Platts Poe (TX) Pompeo Posey Price (GA) Quayle Rahall Reed Rehberg Reichert Renacci Ribble Rivera Roby Roe (TN) Rogers (AL) Rogers (KY) Rogers (MI) Rohrabacher Rokita Rooney Ros-Lehtinen Roskam Ross (AR) Ross (FL) Royce Runyan Ryan (WI) Scalise Schilling Schmidt Schock Schweikert Scott (SC) Scott, Austin Sensenbrenner Sessions Shimkus Shuster Simpson Smith (NE) Smith (NJ) Smith (TX) Southerland Stearns Stivers Stutzman Sullivan Terry Thompson (PA) Thornberry Tiberi Tipton Turner (NY) Turner (OH) Upton Walberg Walden Walsh (IL) Walz (MN) Webster West Westmoreland Whitfield Wilson (SC) Wittman Wolf Womack Woodall Yoder Young (AK) Young (FL) Young (IN)

---- NOES    67 ---

Baldwin Barber Berkley Berman Bishop (NY) Blumenauer Bonamici Braley (IA) Capps Cohen Connolly (VA) Cooper Costello Courtney Cuellar DeFazio DeLauro Deutch Dicks Dingell Doggett Eshoo Farr

Green, Gene Heinrich Higgins Himes Hirono Holden Holt Langevin Larsen (WA) LaTourette Loebsack Lofgren, Zoe Luján Lynch McDermott McNerney Michaud Miller (NC) Miller, George Moran Murphy (CT) Nadler Pastor (AZ)

Perlmutter Quigley Rigell Rothman (NJ) Ryan (OH) Sanchez, Loretta Schrader Schwartz Sherman Shuler Slaughter Smith (WA) Speier Sutton Thompson (CA) Tierney Tsongas Visclosky Wasserman Schultz Waxman Welch

---- ANSWERED “PRESENT”    1 ---

Lipinski

---- NOT VOTING    109 ---

Ackerman Andrews Baca Bass (CA) Becerra Bishop (GA) Brady (PA) Brown (FL) Butterfield Capuano Cardoza Carnahan Carney Carson (IN) Castor (FL) Chu Cicilline Clarke (MI) Clarke (NY) Clay Cleaver Clyburn Conyers Costa Crowley Cummings Davis (CA) Davis (IL) DeGette Doyle Edwards Ellison Engel Fattah Filner Frank (MA) Fudge

Garamendi Gonzalez Green, Al Grijalva Gutierrez Hahn Hanabusa Hastings (FL) Hinchey Hinojosa Honda Hoyer Israel Jackson (IL) Jackson Lee (TX) Johnson (GA) Johnson, E. B. Kaptur Keating Kildee Kucinich Larson (CT) Lee (CA) Levin Lewis (CA) Lewis (GA) Lowey Maloney Markey Matsui McCarthy (NY) McCollum McGovern Meeks Moore Napolitano Neal

Olver Pallone Pascrell Pelosi Peters Pingree (ME) Polis Price (NC) Rangel Reyes Richardson Richmond Roybal-Allard Ruppersberger Rush Sánchez, Linda T. Sarbanes Schakowsky Schiff Scott (VA) Scott, David Serrano Sewell Sires Stark Thompson (MS) Tonko Towns Van Hollen Velázquez Waters Watt Wilson (FL) Woolsey Yarmuth

Issa on Holder Contempt Vote: Fast & Furious Investigation Continues Until We Have All The Facts

GOWDY ON ERIC HOLDER CONTEMPT VOTE: "THIS IS A SAD DAY MR. SPEAKER"

House votes to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt

By Ed O'Keefe and and Sari Horwitz

The House of Representatives voted Thursday to make Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. the first sitting attorney general to be held in contempt of Congress for withholding documents requested as part of a congressional investigation into a botched gun-running operation.


On a vote of 255 to 67, the Republican-led House successfully sanctioned Holder for failing to cooperate with an ongoing probe into Operation “Fast and Furious,” which was led by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives from 2009 to 2011.

In a statement, Holder said the vote “is the regrettable culmination of what became a misguided – and politically motivated – investigation during an election year.” Holder added that the Republicans leading the investigation “have focused on politics over public safety.”

In the coming days, the House is expected to refer the contempt charge to Ronald C. Machen, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, who will have to decide whether to press criminal charges against Holder, his boss. Based on a separate vote Thursday authorizing civil action against Holder, theHouse Oversight and Government Reform Committee is expected to mount a court challenge to President Obama’s decision to invoke executive privilege over some of the documents sought by the panel.

Before the vote, several Democrats walked off the House to protest what they characterize as a politically motivated investigation, backed in recent days by theNational Rifle Association, to embarrass Holder and the White House.

“This is not a principled effort to resolve the issue,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said before her colleagues left the floor.

But House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) disputed those charges.

“I don’t take this matter lightly, and frankly hoped it would never come to this,” he said from the floor. “The House is focused on jobs and the economy. But no Justice Department is above the law and no Justice Department is above the Constitution, which each of us has sworn an oath to uphold.”

Over the course of an almost 18-month investigation, Republicans have said they are chiefly concerned with an attorney general whose Justice Department, in refusing to release documents, has covered up what senior officials knew — and when they knew — about the operation that allowed thousands of firearms onto U.S. streets and into Mexico and resulted in the death of a U.S. border patrol agent, Brian Terry, in December 2010.

Among the dozens of Republican lawmakers who spoke before the vote, Rep. Paul Gosar (Ariz.) said Thursday’s contempt vote was “long overdue” and “welcome news” to the American people.

But Rep. Robert C. Scott (D-Va.) said Holder “has provided all the information. They keep asking. There’s no further legislative purpose to be served — it’s time for the attorney general to get back to work.”

Holder has testified to congressional committees about Fast and Furious nine times over the past 14 months. On Thursday, he traveled to Lake Buena Vista, Fla., to speak at the annual convention of the League of United Latin American Citizens. He attended the White House Congressional Picnic on Wednesday evening to mingle with some of the lawmakers who plan to hold him in contempt.

Adding to the political intrigue, the contempt vote was held just hours after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the individual health insurance mandate at the heart of President Obama’s landmark health-care law.

The conflict between the Justice Department and House Republicans centers on a particular set of documents that the House Oversight and Government Reform Committeesubpoenaed from the Justice Department in October as part of its investigation into Fast and Furious.

The operation, named after the popular movie series, was run out of the ATF's Phoenix division, with the legal backing of the U.S. attorney in Phoenix. As part of the operation, ATF agents purposefully did not interdict more than 2,000 weapons they suspected of being purchased at Arizona gun shops by illegal buyers known as “straw purchasers”; agents hoped to later track them to a Mexican drug cartel.

While conducting Fast and Furious, ATF lost track of most of the firearms, some of which have been found at crime scenes in Mexico and the United States. Two of the guns connected to the operation were found at a site in the Arizona desert where Terry was killed.

Last year, a Justice Department official told lawmakers in a letter that ATF had not ever “sanctioned” or otherwise knowingly allowed the sale of assault weapons to a straw purchaser who then transported them into Mexico. Ten months later, the Justice Department withdrew the letter, acknowledging the botched operation.

That episode has heightened suspicions among Republican lawmakers, who have demanded that the department hand over records of any deliberations it had about Fast and Furious after the Feb. 4, 2011, letter.

Justice officials have insisted that no senior officials in the department knew of the controversial tactics. They also have said they have worked hard to cooperate with requests from the oversight committee. During the past year, Justice officials have turned over 7,600 documents relating to the operation, as well as documents relating to another operation involving “gun-walking,” as the tactic is known, during the George W. Bush administration.

In the days before the vote, the Obama administration joined congressional Democrats in arguing that Holder and the Justice Department went above and beyond previous congressional requests for information and bemoaned that the episode has devolved into a politically motivated exercise.

But the administration’s focus on political motivation was blunted by a handful of moderate House Democrats expected who voted with Republicans to hold the attorney general in contempt. The NRA said before the vote that it planned to track how members voted in determining future endorsements and several moderate Democrats rely on the group’s support in election years.

Staff writer Rosalind S. Helderman contributed to this report.

Speaker John Boehner..We Will Do Our Duty To Get to the Bottom of Fast & Furious

Issa Remarks on Criminal Contempt Resolution for AG Holder on House Floor

White House Can't Hide Behind Executive Privilege on Fast & Furious

FAST & FURIOUS: WATCH LIVE TOMORROW - Holder Contempt Resolution Debate & Votes

House to Vote on Holder Contempt Resolution June 28

Webcast at FastAndFuriousInvestigation.com

WASHINGTON, DC –House Republican Leadership has announced that on Thursday, June 28 the full U.S. House of Representatives will consider a resolution to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt of Congress for refusing to comply with a Congressional subpoena for documents related to Operation Fast and Furious.  Last Wednesday, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform advanced a report recommending the full House find Attorney General Holder in contempt by a vote of 23-17.  The contempt proceedings will be webcast atFastAndFuriousInvestigation.com.  The site includes key documents and media so that taxpayers can get the facts on the gunwalking program and Congressional investigation as they watch the House debate.

Click Here to Watch the House Debate the Holder Contempt Resolution

ReTweetable: RT @GOPOversight: WATCH LIVE #Holder contempt vote w/ all the facts LIVE onJune 28 here: http://bit.ly/MA6eAZ #fastandfurious

Resources available with the webcast include:

·      HOW WE GOT TO CONTEMPT: the collected work of the Oversight Committee investigation, including the committee’s contempt proceedings, the report recommending contempt, fact sheets and more.

·      NEW YOU CAN USE: the timeline of news stories and videos stretching from the murder of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, through the Congressional investigation and Justice Department stonewalling and up to the contempt proceedings.

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Fast and Furious and OCDETF: Whom is Executive Privilege Protecting?

Issa letter hammers Obama on 'Fast and Furious' gun operation

• By Major Garrett
• National Journal

Susan Walsh AP

The chairman of the House oversight committee investigating White House involvement in the botched “gun-walking” program that led to the 2010 death of U.S. Border Patrol agent accused President Obama on Monday of downplaying his involvement in the program or intentionally obstructing the Congress' inquiry.

The letter from Rep. Darrel Issa, R-Calif., to Obama questioned the legal basis of the White House move to withhold subpoenaed documents from the Government Reform and Oversight Committee under protections afforded Obama by executive privilege. The Justice Department denied Issa's committee the subpoenaed documents last week, prompting the GOP-led committee to vote along party lines to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt of Congress.

The full House is scheduled to consider the contempt citation this week. The White House contends it's legally entitled to withhold documents related to internal deliberations on policy and advisory discussions among Obama's senior advisers. It was the first time Obama, who pledged a new era of government transparency, has exerted executive privilege.

Issa said the assertion of executive privilege, which occurred after 16-months of negotiations between his committee and Justice officials over documents related to the gun-walking program called Fast and Furious, raised two troubling questions.

"Either you or your most senior advisers were involved in managing Operation Fast & Furious and the fallout from it...or, you are asserting a presidential power that you know to be unjustified solely for the purpose of further obstructing a congressional investigation," Issa wrote. "To date, the White House has steadfastly maintained that it has not had any role in advising the Department with respect to the congressional investigation. The surprising assertion of executive privilege raised the question of whether that is still the case."

Issa's committee has subpoenaed documents it believes relevant to Justice and White House deliberations that led to a false Justice Department submission—in Holder's name—in February 2011 that Fast and Furious was not a gun walking operation. The committee had been told by whistle-blowers that Fast and Furious allowed large quantities of AK-47 firearms and variants to "walk" into Mexico. Two of those firearms were discovered at the scene where Border Patrol agent Brian Terry was killed near Rio Rico, Az., on Dec. 14, 2010.

The White House dismissed Issa's letter.

“The Congressman’s analysis has as much merit as his absurd contention that Operation Fast and Furious was created in order to promote gun control," said White House spokesman Eric Schultz. "Our position is consistent with Executive Branch legal precedent for the past three decades spanning Administrations of both parties, and dating back to President Reagan’s Department of Justice. The Courts have routinely considered deliberative process privilege claims and affirmed the right of the executive branch to invoke the privilege even when White House documents are not involved.”

Issa has at times suggested Fast and Furious might have been initiated as part of a larger push for tighter U.S. gun control laws. The chairman largely abandoned that theory on the Sunday talk shows.

The Bush administration in its second term initiated the gun-walking program in an attempt to prosecute gun-runners and drug traffickers in Mexico. Under a larger program called Operation Gun Runner, an ill-fated program called Operation Wide Receiver was conducted from 2006-2007. It was riddled with inefficiency and poor inter-agency cooperation and communication. It yielded no arrests or indictments on Bush's watch. The Obama administration reviewed the dormant Bush-era cases and brought charges against nine people accused of low-level gun trafficking offenses. In October 2009, the Obama administration expanded efforts to pursue high-level Mexican drug and arms traffickers. Building on Wide Receiver, efforts at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives greatly expanded the use of surveillance of firearms purchases. These efforts grew into Fast and Furious.

At the heart of Issa's inquiry is how much Justice and the White House knew about the origins of Fast and Furious, its scope and its operational ambitions.

As he did on the Sunday talk shows, Issa held out hope for a compromise over the disputed documents. The full House has never before voted to hold an attorney general in contempt of Congress.

"I remain hopeful that the Attorney General will produce the specified documents," Issa said. Short of that, the chairman urged Obama to "define the universe of documents over which you asserted executive privilege and provide the Committee with the legal justification from the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC)."

Issa acknowledged Justice has provided in excess of 7,600 documents, but said the high-stakes dispute is now over those related to Justice's initial denial—nearly three months after agent Terry's death—that that Fast and Furious was a gun-walking operation.

"These key documents would help the Committee understand how and why the Justice Department moved from denying whistle blower allegations to understanding they were true; the identities of officials who attempted to retaliate against whistle blowers," Issa wrote, adding the committee also want to learn "whether senior (Justice) Department officials are being held to the same standard as lower-level employees who have been blamed for Fast and Furious by their politically-appointed bosses in Washington."

Issa also asked Obama to explain "what extent were you or your most senior advisers involved in Operation Fast and Furious and the fallout from it" and sought documents related to "any communications, meetings, and teleconferences between the White House and the Justice Department between February 4, 2011 and June 18, 2012, the day before the Attorney General requested that you assert executive privilege."

Government Executive

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