Noel Hillman, the Siegelman Case, the USA Firings, and Jack Abramoff

The Abramoff investigation involves Alabama and a cast of Abramoff associates were deeply involved in the 2002 Alabama gubernatorial election, including illegal campaign financing and the possible fixing of the Governor's race in 2002. One character in this scenario has not received much attention, the one-time “Abramoff Prosecutor” for the Bush Administration DoJ.

Here is a good first read on this broad focus:

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Noel Hillman and the Siegelman Case
Scott Horton - http://www.harpers.org/archive/2007/07/hbc-90000509


Noel Hillman is a federal judge in Camden, New Jersey appointed to the court by President Bush in the spring of 2006 .... Early in 2007, the Bush White House decided to appoint Hillman to a coveted seat on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals ... Hillman’s confirmation seemed all but a “done deal.” And then something happened. New Jersey’s leading newspaper, the Newark Star-Ledger ....



Did Hillman’s deep involvement with the prosecution of Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, Wisconsin administrator Georgia Thompson, and a growing number of other cases in which political manipulation of prosecutions are involved cost him a court of appeals judgeship? ......

Hillman is a “loyal Bushie,” and a long-time protégé of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, with whom he served in the New Jersey United States Attorney’s office. Hillman followed Chertoff to the DOJ’s Criminal Division in 2001, and was later selected by Chertoff to head the Public Integrity Section (PIN), one of the most sensitive, and also one of the most intrinsically political positions in the Department of Justice. Reduced to its essence, PIN decides who and what is corrupt in the American political landscape.

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Hillman.... the head of the Public Integrity Section (PIN) within the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division... had responsibility for the prosecution of elected and appointed public officials at all levels of government ....

Country has seen in decades. If Dan Abrams was interested in REALLY going into the history books, all he has to do is follow Horton and bring the story to a bigger audience.

that McCain is sitting on!

Siegelman ..."'I don't know how they can sleep at night taking money from the Indian casinos to deny Alabama schoolchildren...."

On June 3, 2005, the Boston Globe open this can of worms:

Gambling, GOP Politics Intertwine - Casino Payments Seen as Influential
by Michael Kranish - http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0603-08.htm


WASHINGTON -- George W. Bush gave the nation's gambling industry plenty of reason to fear his presidency. .... He wooed religious conservatives by boasting in a presidential debate about his ''strong antigambling record."

But as president, Bush has not spoken out against gambling. .... as Republican lobbyists and activist groups collected tens of millions of dollars from Indian tribes seeking to preserve their casinos. Now those payments are the focus of Senate and Justice Department investigations.

... White House ... annual sessions over a four-year period that were arranged by antitax crusader Grover Norquist ... After Bush dropped his antigambling rhetoric, lobbyists touted their access, and fund-raising from Indian tribes grew exponentially.

...Norquist('s) ... organization received $1.5 million from tribes and fought a tax on Indian casinos; lobbyist Jack Abramoff, a top Bush fund-raiser who earned millions of dollars in fees as a consultant to gaming tribes; and Ralph Reed ... allegedly used some money from Indian gaming tribes to fund his efforts to close down rival casinos and lotteries

.........Bush worked closely with religious conservatives, especially Reed....

..... Tiguas poured tens of thousands of dollars into the campaign of the Democrat running against Bush in 1998 .... Bush redoubled his earlier efforts to shut down the Tigua casino. ... special appropriation ... for the state's attorney general, John Cornyn, now a US senator, to take legal action against the tribe.....

Abramoff, who helped arrange for the rival tribes to give the money to Reed's group, turned around and offered his services to the Tiguas -- for $4.2 million in fees split between himself and a partner

..... Abramoff and his partner in Indian gaming consulting would receive more than $60 million in fees from six different tribes seeking to advance their gambling interests ... Abramoff also told the tribes to give money ... the tribes gave $3 million, two-thirds of it to Republicans

.... Abramoff and Norquist .. worked (for) ... candidate ... following year, Abramoff and Norquist came to Washington together to lead the Republican Party's national effort to recruit college students. Reed soon joined ...


In 1999, Don Siegelman, the Democratic governor of Alabama, proposed a lottery that would have pumped hundreds of millions of dollars into public schools and even provided free college education for most Alabama high school graduates.

Reed, rallying religious conservatives, set out to try to defeat it ... quickly raised $1.15 million .... money came from Norquist's group, Americans for Tax Reform. Norquist ... got the funds from an Indian gaming tribe ...At the time Reed raised the money, he was working for Abramoff ... and Abramoff represented the Mississippi tribe.

Siegelman ..."'I don't know how they can sleep at night taking money from the Indian casinos to deny Alabama schoolchildren...."

.... Abramoff, meanwhile, appears to be the central focus ....Bush has not spoken on the matter.

"Karl Rove in a Corner" by Joshua Green

This story provides some useful background to this discussion:

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"Karl Rove in a Corner" by Joshua Green
November 2004 Atlantic Monthly - http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200411/green

Karl Rove is at his most formidable when running close races, and his skills would be notable even if he used no extreme methods. But he does use them. His campaign history shows his willingness, when challenged, to employ savage tactics.

It is the close races that establish the reputations of great political strategists, and few have ever been closer than the 2000 presidential election. From the tumult of the lengthy recount, the absentee-ballot dispute, the charges of voter fraud, and, ultimately, the Supreme Court decision, George W. Bush emerged victorious by a margin of 537 votes in Florida—enough to elevate him to the presidency, and his chief strategist, Karl Rove, to the status of legend.

But the 2000 election was not Rove's closest race. .........

Former Ala. Governor Turns Tables on Justice Department
Siegelman Connects His Case to Accusations of Interference
By Carrie Johnson - April 13, 2008 - http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/12/AR2008041201903.html


The successful criminal prosecution of former Alabama governor Don Siegelman (D) has become tangled in political charges and countercharges that reflect contrasting views about the independence of the Justice Department.

In the two weeks since his release from prison pending an appeal, Siegelman has sharply increased the volume of his assertions that he was railroaded. He says that Karl Rove, who was a White House adviser, targeted him for prosecution to ensure he did not win reelection to the governor's office and displace a Republican there.

Siegelman is seizing on a theme that is newly popular with politically connected defendants: turning the tables on a Justice Department vulnerable to accusations of interference because of missteps last year under then-Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales.

An appeals court panel in Atlanta will decide .........

who was it that described BFEE like a spiders web? Not Gary Webb, but another journalist ala Webb, hmmm.

Those involved in politicization are not all in the "resigned to spend time with the family" ranks.

Chertoff is in charge of "Homeland Security" now. The Junta lives on, even if KKKarl and Gonzo got caught in too many crimes.