Lost in all the other news about a White House in crisis is this new story from
Bloomberg:
Justice Department Didn't Act on Warning About Abramoff Client
It is about the post 9-11 security loophole created when a US territory, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), is left in charge of their own immigration, customs and labor laws. It seems that the Bush WH worked with Abramoff to suppress a post 9-11 report that warned:
...continued local control over the Marianas' borders will ``seriously jeopardize the national security'' of the U.S.
Not only was the report suppressed, it authors were "reassigned". One of them was already in hot water for investigating Jack's lobbying efforts on behalf of court officials in Guam.
More on the jump...
This Bloomberg report is worth a look. Here are some highlights.
On terrorism:
The Justice Department report on the Marianas said the islands, which rely on tourism and are home to military facilities and visiting U.S. Navy vessels, ``offer a target-rich environment for terrorist activity.''
Under a 1976 covenant between the commonwealth and the U.S., immigration laws don't apply to the Marianas ``except in the manner and to the extent made applicable to them by the Congress.''
Abramoff lobbied against efforts to tighten those laws. The islands have 28,717 foreign workers, compared with 6,006 natives, in the labor force, according to Central Intelligence Agency statistics.
On the Report:
The U.S. Justice Department never acted on a post-Sept. 11 proposal, contested by lobbyist Jack Abramoff, calling for increased federal control over immigration to the Mariana Islands. [snip]
The report, dated May 6, 2002, was prepared by Robert Meissner, then a regional security specialist for the Justice Department, at the request of Frederick Black, who at the time was the acting United States attorney for Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands. Meissner had jurisdiction over security issues for the commonwealth.
And what Jack did:
In an Oct, 1, 2001, e-mail to the Marianas government, Abramoff said he was alerted to the pending immigration report by the Justice Department chief of staff, whom he hosted in his luxury box at a Washington Redskins football game. He said he would pass on to the government any information he received from the official. At the time, David Ayres was chief of staff. [snip]
In the e-mail, Abramoff warned that some ``bad guys'' in Justice had been saying the commonwealth ``if not taken over, will be a major entry point for terrorists. This, of course, is patently ridiculous and we have been working to counter this.''
Abramoff said he would meet with then-Attorney General John Ashcroft. One of Abramoff's associates was Kevin Ring, who joined the firm after serving as counsel to a Judiciary subcommittee that Ashcroft chaired when he served in the U.S. Senate.
``We'll hope the higher ups will take some time to squash this on their own,'' Abramoff wrote. [snip]
Both men [Black and Meissner] were subsequently transferred to lesser positions. Black is now an assistant U.S. attorney in the Marianas, and Meissner was reassigned from his job reviewing security for the commonwealth and 10 other U.S. attorney's offices and now works in the U.S. attorney's office in northern Virginia. Black and Meissner declined to comment.
Justice Department Inspector General Glenn Fine is looking into the reasons behind Black's removal as acting U.S. attorney, spokesman Paul Martin said. The Los Angeles Times reported in August that Black's demotion came after he began exploring Abramoff's lobbying efforts on behalf of court officials in Guam, another U.S. territory. [snip]
Lawmakers of both parties said they never saw the recommendations. [snip]
[John] Conyers said Congress needed to pass legislation in line with the report's recommendations. ``It still needs to be acted upon,'' he said. ``We've got a security problem here, and it's a serious one.''
Yet another reason for an Independent Prosecutor to examine All Things Abramoff!