{"id":1603,"date":"2007-04-18T15:06:00","date_gmt":"2007-04-18T21:06:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2007\/04\/guv-explains-why-he-hasnt-called-for-gonzales-ouster\/"},"modified":"2007-04-18T15:06:00","modified_gmt":"2007-04-18T21:06:00","slug":"guv-explains-why-he-hasnt-called-for-gonzales-ouster","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2007\/04\/guv-explains-why-he-hasnt-called-for-gonzales-ouster\/","title":{"rendered":"Guv explains why he hasn’t called for Gonzales ouster"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Gov. Bill Richardson<\/a> says he hasn\u2019t joined other Democrats and a number of Republicans in calling for the firing of U.S. Attorney Alberto Gonzales<\/a> because they\u2019re both Hispanic. <\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Richardson<\/st1:city><\/st1:place>\u2019s comments were published today in The Hill<\/a>.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cThe only reason I\u2019m not there is because he\u2019s Hispanic, and I know him and like him,\u201d The Hill quoted Richardson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> as saying. \u201cIt\u2019s because he\u2019s Hispanic. I\u2019m honest. I want to give him the benefit of the doubt.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Gonzales has been under fire for a number of issues, but the most prominent has been his poor handling of the firing of eight U.S. attorneys late last year and statements he has made publicly about the situation that contradict those of Justice Department staffers. Gonzales is set to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee<\/a> Thursday morning, and many say he will lose additional support and, perhaps, his job if he doesn\u2019t satisfy congressional investigators looking into the firings.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Today\u2019s comments were Richardson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city>\u2019s first on the topic. His silence has been notable because at the center of the controversy is former U.S. Attorney David Iglesias<\/a> of New Mexico, who alleges he was fired because he refused pressure from two Republican members of Congress to speed indictments in a public corruption case in time to sway voters in the November 2006 election.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Richardson told The Hill that Gonzales is \u201creally in quicksand\u201d and that he\u2019s disappointed he \u201cthinks of himself as the president\u2019s lawyer\u201d and not the attorney of the American people.<\/p>\n

\n

Richardson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> said he\u2019s close to calling for Gonzales\u2019 ouster if he doesn\u2019t address concerns.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Gov. Bill Richardson says he hasn\u2019t joined other Democrats and a number of Republicans in calling for the firing of U.S. Attorney Alberto Gonzales because they\u2019re both Hispanic. Richardson\u2019s comments were published today in The Hill. \u201cThe only reason I\u2019m not there is because he\u2019s Hispanic, and I know him and like him,\u201d The Hill […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1603","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1603","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1603"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1603\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}