The Clinton Papers: Was Elena Kagan Paid off With Supreme Court Seat? – National Law Enforcement |
http://www.examiner.com/article/the-clinton-papers-elena-kagan-paid-off-with-supreme-court-seat
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The Friday release of 10,000 pages of Clinton White House documents scored an enormous amount of media attention with broadcast and print news reporters scouring the pages and covering the sordid Monica Lewinsky affair and the Paula Jones allegations and civil case. However, hidden in the historical documents is evidence that Associate Justice Elena Kagan achieved her position on the nation’s highest court as reward for being a “good soldier” in the “war to defend President Bill Clinton.”
Elena Kagan and Sen. Patrick “Leaky” Leahy holding a photo op during her confirmation hearings.
Elena Kagan and Sen. Patrick “Leaky” Leahy holding a photo op during her confirmation hearings.
US Senate Photo Gallery
According to a section on Kagan, a Washington, D.C., lawyer, she served in the Clinton White House as a associate counsel to the president in 1995-96 and then deputy assistant to the White House Domestic Policy and then deputy director of the Domestic Policy Council (DPC) from 1997-1999. While Justice Kagan performed duties with regard to AIDS, budget appropriations, campaign finance reform, education, health, labor, race, tobacco, Native Americans, and welfare, her most important job was the handling a lawsuit brought against President Bill Clinton by a woman who claimed then Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton had sexually harassed her.
The released documents touch on how Elena Kagan as a White House counsel defended Bill Clinton against allegations in a civil suit brought by an ex-Arkansas state employee named Paula Jones. In one May 1996 memo, Kagan appeared to be more concerned with how it looked “unseemly” for the president to be represented in court by so many attorneys, but made no mention of how unseemly it was for a sitting U.S. President to be accused of bullying a defenseless low-tier employee.
In the documents submitted to the opposing counsel and to the judge in the case, Kagan had many of the attorney’s names — who worked on the case — removed from the cover-sheets for all documents and correspondence. “While not a criminal act or even a serious breach of civil law, [Kagan’s] actions in removing those names could be considered unethical. Let me put it this way, if you or I did such a thing with legal documents, the judge or judges would not act kindly towards us,” said political strategist and attorney Laurence Collier-Stevenson. “Ask yourself: is this the kind of person you want passing judgement on the entire government and nation?” he asked rhetorically.
“It’s amazing how the political party that claims it fights for women’s rights, in order to protect a sexual predator, smeared, harassed and ridiculed any and all women who came forward to point fingers at a president some believe was — and still is — a predatory sociopath,” Collier-Stevenson added.
President Clinton’s testimony during the Paula Jones lawsuit, in which he emphatically denied a sexual relationship with Lewinsky, ended up in having the U.S. Congress, including some Democrats, voting for his impeachment in 1998. Although the House passed two articles of impeachment against Clinton, he was acquitted by the Senate.
“For all their talk about fighting for women’s rights, the feckless Senators on both sides of the aisle gave Clinton a pass and allowed him to deny justice to a low-level, female employee who even the media denigrated in their haste to protect their beloved Bill Clinton,” said former sex crimes detective Alicia Rose Amato.
The Democratic Party leadership was obviously grateful for Kagan’s role in defending Clinton, who later was charged with perjury for his alleged deceitful answers during the civil case. Prior to the election of President Barack Obama, Kagan’s name was bandied as a potential nominee to the Supreme Court of the United States if a Democratic president were elected in 2008.
When President Obama nominated Kagan, during her confirmation, which failed to garner the drama that usually follows the Supreme Court nominations made by Republicans, not one of the Senators asked her about her work for the White House in defending Bill Clinton and she was confirmed by a vote of 63 Yeas to 37 Nays.
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