CNN: Arkansas Senator Pryor: Attorney General "lied to the Senate and to the people I represent"

Sen. Pryor: Attorney general lied to Senate
March 15, 2007

Sen. Mark Pryor called for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales' resignation Thursday, saying Gonzales "lied to the Senate and to the people I represent."

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Arkansas Democratic Sen. Mark Pryor bluntly accused Attorney General Alberto Gonzales of lying to the Senate about replacing federal prosecutors with interim appointees and joined calls for Gonzales' resignation Thursday.

"When an attorney general lies to a United States senator, I think it is time for that attorney general to go," Pryor said on the Senate floor.

"He did not only lie to me as a person, but when he lied to me, he lied to the Senate and to the people I represent."...

The administration...admitted one of the fired prosecutors, U.S. attorney H.E. "Bud" Cummins in Little Rock, Arkansas, had been removed to make way for Timothy Griffin, a former aide to White House political adviser Karl Rove....

When asked about the matter in January, Gonzales told the Senate Judiciary Committee the Bush administration planned to replace the interim appointees with nominees who would be confirmed by the Senate.

But documents released after Monday's resignation of Gonzales' chief of staff, Kyle Sampson, showed Sampson hoped to "run out the clock" and keep Griffin in place over the objections of Pryor and his Arkansas colleague, Blanche Lincoln....

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