In This Article
30-Second Summary
Headline Links: The president's decision, clemency order, and statements
Background: Libby's sentencing, trial, and crimes
Reactions/Analysis: Political reactions, repercussions, and motivations
Opinions: Should Bush have commuted Libby's sentence?
Historical Context: History's notable pardons
Related Topics: Libby's appeal denied
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Bush Commutes Libby's Prison Sentence
by
findingDulcinea Staff
President Bush stops short of pardoning Cheney's former chief of staff, deciding to leave in place a $250,000 fine and his federal convictions; in the subsequent furor both Democrats and Republicans accuse their opponents of hypocrisy.
30-Second Summary
In a written statement, President George W. Bush described the 30-month prison sentence as "excessive." However, Bush refrained from granting I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby a full pardon. Libby's convictions for perjury and obstruction of justice will stand, and though the president commuted the prison sentence, Libby will be on probation for two years.
Libby's case has been steeped in controversy because its roots lie in the Bush administration’s efforts to raise support for the Iraq war, a conflict that has become increasingly unpopular among the U.S. electorate.
As a result, critics have taken on decidedly strident tones, charging the president with cronyism, hypocrisy, and a lack of respect for justice.
However, Libby’s defenders have cast him as the undeserving scapegoat of a zealous prosecutor in a politically motivated case.
From a broader perspective, the controversy has renewed a critical interest in past controversies concerning presidential clemency.
From Gerald Ford pardoning Richard Nixon to Bill Clinton pardoning his half-brother, the exercise of presidential clemency has often been a controversial issue. And to some analysts, its use points to the kind of favoritism and hypocrisy that continues to disenchant Americans from both ends of the political spectrum.
Libby's case has been steeped in controversy because its roots lie in the Bush administration’s efforts to raise support for the Iraq war, a conflict that has become increasingly unpopular among the U.S. electorate.
As a result, critics have taken on decidedly strident tones, charging the president with cronyism, hypocrisy, and a lack of respect for justice.
However, Libby’s defenders have cast him as the undeserving scapegoat of a zealous prosecutor in a politically motivated case.
From a broader perspective, the controversy has renewed a critical interest in past controversies concerning presidential clemency.
From Gerald Ford pardoning Richard Nixon to Bill Clinton pardoning his half-brother, the exercise of presidential clemency has often been a controversial issue. And to some analysts, its use points to the kind of favoritism and hypocrisy that continues to disenchant Americans from both ends of the political spectrum.
Headline Links: The president's decision, clemency order, and statements
President Bush's decision came on the same day that a federal appeals court denied Libby's request to postpone his prison sentence until after his appeal process was complete.
Source: The Chicago Tribune
The White House offers the full text of President Bush's clemency order.
Source: The White House official Web site
The White House also offers President Bush's written statement concerning the commutation of Libby's sentence.
Source: The White House official Web site
Background: Libby's sentencing, trial, and crimes
See our Beyond the Headlines story on Libby's trial and sentencing for the full background to this story.
Source: findingDulcinea
On Tuesday June 5, 2007, U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton told Libby that his "lies blocked an extremely serious investigation, and as a result you will indeed go to prison." Walton then sentenced the former White House aide to 30 months in prison and fined hime $250,000. Although Libby's attorneys argued that the sentence was unfair, Judge Walton responded by saying that "people who occupy these these types of positions, where they have the welfare and security of the nation in their hands, have a special obligation to not do anything that might create a problem."
Source: The Christian Science Monitor
According to Libby's indictment, he committed perjury during his testimonies in the CIA leak case on May 5 and 24, 2004. The Washington Post offers a timeline of the case.
Source: The Washington Post
The Washington Post also offers online versions of all the evidence federal prosecutors brought against Libby during the CIA leak trial.
Source: The Washington Post
Libby was convicted of one count of obstruction of justice, one count of making false statements, and two counts of perjury.
Source: The Washington Post
In July 2003, Joseph Wilson published an article in the New York Times to debunk the Bush administration's claim that Saddam Hussein had been trying to buy uranium in Africa. Wilson, an ex-U.S. ambassador, had been sent to Niger to investigate that assertion in 2002. He found no evidence of a yellowcake deal with Iraq, and reported as much to the White House. In his Times article, he concluded that "some of the intelligence related to Iraq's nuclear weapons program was twisted to exaggerate the Iraqi threat."
Source: The New York Times (may require free registration)
On July 14, 2003, Bob Novak made the following statement in his Washington Post column: "Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an agency operative on weapons of mass destruction." It was this public revelation that suggested to investigators that Plame's identity had been leaked to punish her husband's opposition to the Iraq war.
Source: The Washington Post
On October 5, 2003, Joseph Wilson appeared on Meet the Press. He claimed that his wife's identity as a CIA agent had been leaked to the press by White House officials to punish him for speaking out against the Iraq war.
Source: MSNBC
Reactions/Analysis: Political reactions, repercussions, and motivations
In an analysis of the political reactions to Libby's commutation titled "Hypocrisy abounds on all sides of Libby case," Associated Press writer Ron Fournier states that "the decision to commute the sentence of a convicted liar brought out the worst in both parties." In response to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), Fournier reiterates her husband's controversial pardons: Bill Clinton pardoned his half-brother, Roger, convicted of distributing cocaine, and Marc Rich, who fled the country after being indicted for tax evasion. Marc Rich's wife had donated more than $1 million to the Democratic party.
Source: CNN
President Bush's decision has garnered both criticism and support from Congress: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said that "Libby's conviction was the one faint glimmer of accountability for White House efforts to manipulate intelligence and silence critics of the Iraq War. Now, even that small bit of justice has been undone." House Minority Whip Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) said the President "did the right thing today in commuting the prison term for Scooter Libby. The punishment did not fit the crime."
Source: USA Today
The Associated Press rounds up reactions from many of Washington's major politicians. White House hopeful Rudy Giuliani said that "the president came to a reasonable decision and I believe the decision was correct." Sen. Clinton said that the "commutation sends the clear signal that in this administration, cronyism and ideology trump competence and justice."
Source: Yahoo News
According to the Los Angeles Times, Libby's commutation shows that President Bush is trying to regain favor with his conservative backers. "He's playing to his base. He's sort of retreating to his hard disk––his core beliefs," said Princeton University Political Scientist Fred I. Greenstein. "He won't antagonize anyone who didn't already hate him, and he will give solace and encouragement to the people who like him but are having doubts about his resolve," said Republican pollster Whit Ayres.
Source: The Los Angeles Times (may require free registration)
However, Robert Novak writes in the Chicago Sun Times that the commutation "did not fully satisfy restive conservatives" who have been calling for Libby's full pardon. Novak writes that this view is evidenced by their seemingly "muted" praise for the decision. In fact, the only person who is satisfied is Libby, now that he "can breathe a sigh of relief that he does not have to serve prison time, but hardly anybody else is all that happy."
Source: The Chicago Sun Times
Libby's prosecutor, Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald, refrained from criticizing the president's decision, but did question his description of Libby's sentence as "excessive." In a released statement Fitzgerald said that Libby's sentence was "imposed pursuant to the laws governing sentencings which occur every day throughout this country. In this case, an experienced federal judge considered extensive argument from the parties and then imposed a sentence consistent with the applicable laws. It is fundamental to the rule of law that all citizens stand before the bar of justice as equals."
Source: The Jurist
Bill Clinton has also criticized President Bush for Libby's commutation, saying during a radio interview that "this is consistent with [the Bush Administration's] philosophy; they believe that they should be able to do what they want to do, and that the law is a minor obstacle."
Source: The Boston Globe
Opinions: Should Bush have commuted Libby's sentence?
The Washington Times criticizes Bush's decision, writing that "perjury is a serious crime. This newspaper argued on behalf of its seriousness in the 1990s, during the Clinton perjury controversy, and today is no different. We'd have hoped that more conservatives would agree. The integrity of the judicial process depends on fact-finding and truth-telling. A jury found Libby guilty of not only perjury but also obstruction of justice and lying to a grand jury. It handed down a very supportable verdict."
Source: The Washington Times
David Corn of the Nation writes that "Bush claimed he would bring responsibility to the White House and, as a PR stunt, he dubbed his campaign jet Accountability One. Yet with this commutation, he takes the position that in his administration an aide who purposefully misleads government officials investigating a possible national security crime need not be held fully accountable."
Source: The Nation
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer criticizes President Bush's seeming disrespect for the Department of Justice, writing that "President Bush's commutation of a pal's prison sentence counts as a most shocking act of disrespect for the U.S. justice system. It's the latest sign of the huge repairs to American concepts of the rule of law that await the next president."
Source: The Seattle Post-Intelligencer
The New York Times writes that "when he was running for president, George W. Bush loved to contrast his law-abiding morality with that of President Clinton ... [but] judging from his decision yesterday to commute the 30-month sentence of I. Lewis Libby Jr.––who was charged with perjury and convicted––untarnished ideals are less of a priority than protecting the secrets of his inner circle and mollifying the tiny slice of right-wing Americans left in his political base."
Source: The New York Times (may require free registration)
The Chicago Tribune writes that "in nixing the prison term, Bush sent a terrible message to citizens and to government officials who are expected to serve the public with integrity. The way for a president to discourage the breaking of federal laws is by letting fairly rendered consequences play out, however uncomfortably for everyone involved. The message to a Scooter Libby ought to be the same as it is for other convicts: You do the crime, you do the time."
Source: The Chicago Tribune
The Washington Post half agrees with Bush's decision, writing that "we agree that a pardon would have been inappropriate and that the prison sentence of 30 months was excessive. But reducing the sentence to no prison time at all, as Mr. Bush did––to probation and a large fine––is not defensible."
Source: The Washington Post
The Wall Street Journal thinks that President Bush should have granted Libby a full pardon, writing that "by failing to issue a full pardon, Mr. Bush is evading responsibility for the role his Administration played in letting the Plame affair build into fiasco and, ultimately, this personal tragedy ... Mr. Libby deserved better from the President whose policies he tried to defend when others were running for cover. The consequences for the reputation of his Administration will also be long-lasting."
Source: The Wall Street Journal (may require subscription)
The National Review Online commends the President's decision for a number of reasons, writing that "he CIA-leak investigation was a fundamentally political exercise from Day One ... investigators knew that it was former State Department official Richard Armitage, not Libby, who originally leaked the identity of CIA employee Valerie Plame Wilson. The Justice Department also knew enough to conclude that Libby had not violated the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, the law at issue in the case. Lacking proof that an underlying crime took place, and knowing the source of the leak, the Justice Department should have shut down the investigation then and there."
Source: The National Review Online
Byron York of the National Review Online criticizes those "Democrats eager to go on record condemning the president ... [but] the problem with much of the rhetoric is that it fails to take into account the full meaning and practice of the president’s clemency powers ... frankly political pardons [are] something the Founding Fathers envisioned when they gave the president the power to pardon, to commute sentences, and to offer mercy in other forms."
Source: The National Review Online
Townhall's Debra J. Saunders agrees with Bush's decision, but writes that her "complaint is that Bush did not commute other sentences for individuals serving "excessive" time under the federal mandatory minimum sentencing laws. Saunders goes on to quote the President of Families Against Mandatory Minimums Julie Stewart: "There are hundreds if not thousands of worthy clemency petitions awaiting the president's decision––these prisoners don't have the same White House connections as Scooter Libby, but they deserve the same serious consideration he received."
Source: Townhall
Investor's Business Daily applauds the President, writing that Libby "was found guilty only after what was clearly a politically motivated trial during which he was charged with covering up a non-crime ... Libby's life and career have been exemplary. Yet, for misremembering some comments he made to journalists, he got 30 months in prison — a grave miscarriage of justice if ever there was one."
Source: Investor's Business Daily
Historical Context: History's notable pardons
In 1974, President Gerald Ford pardoned former president Richard Nixon for his involvement in the Watergate break in. The Washington Post has created a list of the most notable pardons and commutations in recent history.
Source: The Washington Post
Related Topics: Libby's appeal denied
Libby's motion to delay his prison sentence until after the appeal process was denied by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on the same day that President Bush granted his commutation. Libby's lawyers argued that his conviction would likely be overturned on appeal, but the appeals court found their arguments unconvincing.
Source: The Jurist
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