RESIGNATION  (CONT)

McNulty also told Congress that the decision to fire the eight U.S. attorneys in December was made solely by the Justice Department. He was furious, aides said, after learning later that Sampson had discussed the potential firings with the White House since at least January 2005.

Gonzales maintains the firings were needed to replace underperforming U.S. attorneys, and has disagreed with McNulty's testimony that Cummins had been fired for any other reason.

"The attorney general is extremely upset with the stories on the US Attys this morning," Justice spokesman Brian Roehrkasse wrote in a Feb. 7 e-mail after McNulty testified. "He also thought some of the DAG's statements were inaccurate."
Gonzales and Sampson's lawyer have both said McNulty should have been well aware of the circumstances surrounding the firings. In his own Senate testimony last month, Gonzales indicated he trusted his most senior aides, including McNulty, to decide which prosecutors would be asked to resign.

"It was to be a group of officials, including the deputy attorney general, who were much more knowledgeable than I about the performance of each U.S. attorney," Gonzales said.

However, e-mails released by the department show McNulty was not intimately involved in all of the choices and at one point questioned the dismissal of U.S. Attorney Daniel Bogden in Nevada.

"I'm a little skittish about Bogden," McNulty wrote in a Dec. 7 e-mail to Sampson. He concluded: "I'll admit have not looked at his district's performance. Sorry to be raising this again/now; it was just on my mind last night and this morning."

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89 Nations
& 8 states
have banned
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