I know, the AP doesn't like people linking its stories, but I'm going to do it anyway.
Going back to May 2007, the Office of Professional Responsibility and the Justice Department's Inspector General investigated charges of applicants being turned down for jobs within the department based solely on political leaning. What did they find? [flip]
"Individuals at the department were rejecting any of our candidates who could be construed as left-wing or who were perceived, based on their appearances and resumes and so forth, as being more liberal," Kevin Ohlson, deputy director of the department's executive office of immigration review, complained to Justice investigators.
To cut to the chase:
The investigation is one of several that examine accusations of White House political meddling within the Justice Department. Those accusations were initially driven by the firings of nine U.S. attorneys in late 2006 and culminated with the ouster of Alberto Gonzales as attorney general last September.
The report issued Tuesday concluded that politics and ideology disqualified a significant number of newly graduated lawyers and summer interns seeking coveted Justice jobs in 2006.
The report (read the PDF here) takes a particularly close look at a Michael Elston, who joined the department in 1999 as an assistant US Attorney. Monica Goodling (remember her, from the attorneys who were fired last year?) asked him to lead the screening committee in 2006. Per the report:
Although Elston was aware that Goodling claimed in her congressional testimony to have told Elston he should identify candidates who appeared to share the Attorney General’s philosophy, he told us he did not recall her telling him that.
The reporting of the incriminating evidence in the PDF starts on page 68.
Happily, this is not getting ignored:
"This is the first smoking gun," said Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee. "We believe there will be more to come. This report shows clearly that politics and ideology replaced merit as the hiring criteria at one of our most prized civil service departments."
Wouldn't it be surprising if a day passed WITHOUT a Republican scandal?