The US Senate was to hold a no-confidence debate on US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales yesterday, despite the White House's continued support for him in a controversy over the firings of US prosecutors.
As the debate loomed, White House spokesman Tony Snow insisted US President George W. Bush wanted to keep Gonzales in the job on Sunday.
Yesterday's discussion came almost a week after a former White House aide, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, was sentenced to jail for perjury and weeks after Bush's former deputy defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz agreed to resign as president of the World Bank over a favoritism scandal.
The Senate is now to act on a motion of no-confidence in Gonzales, who faces pressure to resign over allegations that he fired eight US prosecutors because they showed insufficient loyalty to Bush's Republican Party.
Asked whether Bush's backing for Gonzales would be shaken if Republicans rounded on him by supporting the no-confidence vote, Snow said: "Not a bit. Purely symbolic vote."
"It is obvious that the president has the right to hire and fire people who serve at his pleasure," Snow said. "Nobody's found anything untoward in terms of what happened."
Democratic Senator Richard Durbin however questioned why Bush was willing to back the unpopular Gonzales while agreeing to replace General Peter Pace as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to avoid a divisive showdown in Congress focusing on the Iraq war.
"Here's a man who has ... said things on Capitol Hill which he's had to recant and staff people said things were being done at the Department of Justice that shouldn't be," Durbin said. "And the president is willing to stand by his man."
Bush has resisted pressure for Gonzales to go, including from several lawmakers in his own party. The row began in March when evidence from e-mails and testimony from a top former aide linked Gonzales to the sackings.
Bush last month expressed confidence in Gonzales, saying the Department of Justice was investigating the sackings of the federal attorneys last year.
The supposedly "symbolic" gesture follows some real censures of former top officials of the Bush administration.
Wolfowitz is to step down from the World Bank on June 30 after damaging allegations of favoritism involving his girlfriend, a bank employee.
A new online voting system aimed at boosting turnout among the Philippines’ millions of overseas workers ahead of Monday’s mid-term elections has been marked by confusion and fears of disenfranchisement. Thousands of overseas Filipino workers have already cast their ballots in the race dominated by a bitter feud between President Ferdinand Marcos Jr and his impeached vice president, Sara Duterte. While official turnout figures are not yet publicly available, data from the Philippine Commission on Elections (COMELEC) showed that at least 134,000 of the 1.22 million registered overseas voters have signed up for the new online system, which opened on April 13. However,
ALLIES: Calling Putin his ‘old friend,’ Xi said Beijing stood alongside Russia ‘in the face of the international counter-current of unilateralism and hegemonic bullying’ Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) yesterday was in Moscow for a state visit ahead of the Kremlin’s grand Victory Day celebrations, as Ukraine accused Russia’s army of launching air strikes just hours into a supposed truce. More than 20 foreign leaders were in Russia to attend a vast military parade today marking 80 years since the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II, taking place three years into Russia’s offensive in Ukraine. Putin ordered troops into Ukraine in February 2022 and has marshaled the memory of Soviet victory against Nazi Germany to justify his campaign and rally society behind the offensive,
CONFLICTING REPORTS: Beijing said it was ‘not familiar with the matter’ when asked if Chinese jets were used in the conflict, after Pakistan’s foreign minister said they were The Pakistan Army yesterday said it shot down 25 Indian drones, a day after the worst violence between the nuclear-armed rivals in two decades. Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif vowed to retaliate after India launched deadly missile strikes on Wednesday morning, escalating days of gunfire along their border. At least 45 deaths were reported from both sides following Wednesday’s violence, including children. Pakistan’s military said in a statement yesterday that it had “so far shot down 25 Israeli-made Harop drones” at multiple location across the country. “Last night, India showed another act of aggression by sending drones to multiple locations,” Pakistan military spokesman Ahmed
US President Donald Trump on Wednesday said that he would make a decision about how the US government would refer to the body of water commonly known as the Persian Gulf when he visits Arab states next week. Trump told reporters at the White House that he expects his hosts in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates will ask him about the US officially calling the waterway the Arabian Gulf or Gulf of Arabia. “They’re going to ask me about that when I get there, and I’ll have to make a decision,” Trump said. “I don’t want to hurt anybody’s
RSS