Iowa Sen. Charles Grassley said Wednesday that President-elect Barack Obama's selection of Eric Holder as attorney general threatens his new administration with its first controversy.
Grassley also said that New York Sen. Hillary Clinton is qualified to be secretary of state, but that her ex-president husband's work since leaving the White House could create problems for her confirmation
"I believe it's going to be much more controversial than a new administration ought to try to put forth," said Grassley, R-Ia., a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Grassley said Holder's role in advising Clinton on his pardon of Marc Rich, as the president prepared to leave office in 2001, could reflect negatively on the nominee during the committee's confirmation hearings.
"I have vague memories of some of his actions being very, very controversial," Grassley said.
Holder said at the time he was "neutral, leaning toward favorable" on pardoning Rich, a wealthy commodities dealer who had been wanted on charges of tax violations.
The pardon, issued on Clinton's final day in office, sparked controversy in part because Rich's former wife, Denise Rich, had been a major contributor to Clinton's presidential library.
Grassley said he recalled Holder's reputation and skill as a lawyer and federal prosecutor being sterling.
"So, I don't want to knock his credentials, and I tend to have deference to a president on who they might want to appoint," Grassley said.
"But if he's done some things that were strictly political, like in the case of Rich, it might question the judgment he uses, and in turn question the judgment of Obama," Grassley continued.
http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20081120/NEWS09/811200361/-1/BUSINESS04Then there is Orrin Hatch
Hatch on Holder: 'I Intend to Support Him'
"I think Eric Holder has a reputation and an experience factor that is very much in his favor. I respect the man, and I intend to support him," Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) told reporters in the Capitol.
Hatch called the Rich pardon "one of the embarassments of the Clinton administration's aftermath." But, he added, "the president had an absolute right to do that."
"I'm not going to hold that against
," Hatch said.
http://legaltimes.typepad.com/blt/2008/11/hatch-on-holder-i-intend-to-support-him.html