Bush Nominates Chertoff for Homeland Post

WASHINGTON – Michael Chertoff, President Bush’s choice to run the Homeland Security Department, has won Senate confirmation on three prior occasions, but not since the anti-terrorism policies he helped develop have come under sharp criticism.

Chertoff is expected to win Senate approval again, but only after pointed questioning about his role in crafting the USA Patriot Act, which greatly expanded the government’s surveillance and detention powers since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and other decisions that led to the arrest and lengthy jailing of hundreds of foreigners.

Critics say the administration has eroded civil liberties in its post-Sept. 11 actions. The American Civil Liberties Union said Chertoff seemed to view the Bill of Rights “as an obstacle to national security rather than a guidebook for how to do security properly.”

Bush tapped Chertoff on Tuesday, saying he “has shown a deep commitment to the cause of justice and an unwavering determination to protect the American people.”

If confirmed, Chertoff would give up his seat on the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia, to which Bush appointed him in 2003. Chertoff said at the White House, “If confirmed as secretary, I will be proud to stand again with the men and women who form our front line against terror.”

Prior to his confirmation as a federal judge, he also won Senate approval to be U.S. attorney in New Jersey and assistant attorney general.

Sen. Joe Lieberman, ranking Democrat on the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, said he doubts Chertoff’s role in crafting the Patriot Act “will be, in itself, a disqualification.” More pressing, Lieberman said, are Chertoff’s plans to manage a sprawling bureaucracy prone to infighting and competition with outside law enforcement and intelligence agencies.

Another major part of Chertoff’s job would be working with an estimated 80 congressional committees and subcommittees that have homeland security oversight. Rep. Chris Cox, R-Calif., chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said he is confident Chertoff is up to the task.

Cox and others who have known Chertoff during his several stints in government said his experience and intense personality make him suited to the job. He would replace Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, the amiable politician who helped build the department.

“He knows the agencies involved in the post-9/11 efforts,” said Christopher Wray, Chertoff’s successor as chief of the Justice Department’s criminal division. “He will be able, if confirmed, to step into the job and get cracking.”

Glenn Ivey was the attorney for Senate Democrats during the Clinton-era Whitewater investigation and Chertoff was his Republican counterpart. If Chertoff is “as tough on terrorists as he was on the Democrats in the Whitewater investigation, the nation is in pretty good hands, ” Ivey said.

Chertoff, 51, is “not going to be Mr. Congeniality, but maybe that’s what you need” to force 22 different agencies inside the Homeland Security Department to work smoothly together, said Ivey, prosecutor for Prince George’s County, Md.

Where Ridge, a former Pennsylvania governor, tended to delegate authority, Chertoff has a reputation as a hands-on manager, a trait that was much in evidence when he served as chief of the Justice Department’s criminal division at the time of the attacks.

Chertoff personally argued the government’s case in its effort to prevent terrorism suspect Zacarias Moussaoui from questioning a captive al-Qaida leader to obtain evidence he claims could exonerate him.

The Moussaoui case, which is ongoing, is one of several high-profile cases from Chertoff’s tenure at the criminal division that the government either lost or has yet to resolve.

Charges in the prosecution in Detroit of an alleged terrorist sleeper cell were thrown out because of misconduct by prosecutors.

A Saudi graduate student in Boise, Idaho, was acquitted for lack of evidence on charges he created an Internet network that prosecutors claimed fostered Islamic extremism and helped recruit potential terrorists.

Paul Rosenzweig, a senior legal research fellow at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, said Chertoff bears some responsibility for the prosecutions his office undertook, but he called Chertoff a “stunningly good choice.”

“We took a lot of strong steps in the aftermath of 9/11,” Rosenzweig said. “He’s shown a willingness 3 1/2 years later to kind of look up and see whether we needed all of them.”

Chertoff has defended administration policies as balanced, but he also has called for taking a fresh look at the policy of detaining terror suspects and questioned the extent to which that process should be open to judicial review.

His last Senate confirmation hearing was in May 2003, before the Justice Department inspector general issued a critical report on the detention of hundreds of foreigners and the abuse of prisoners in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay came to light.

Asked at that hearing whether the government took any steps after Sept. 11 that went too far, Chertoff replied, “I don’t know if I’m in a position to render the judgment of history, because as you point out, we’re still in the swirl of things.”

Still, one reason Bush chose the former U.S. attorney for New Jersey, one-time Supreme Court clerk and Harvard Law School graduate is that he is a safe pick. Bush’s first choice, former New York City police commissioner Bernard Kerik, withdrew last month citing immigration problems regarding a nanny.

Chertoff was confirmed 88-1 in 2003, and several Democratic senators praised his selection Tuesday.