The White House accused Bill and Hillary Clinton of “chutzpah” Thursday for criticizing President Bush’s decision to wipe away the prison sentence of former aide I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby.
“I don’t know what Arkansan is for chutzpah, but this is a gigantic case of it,” White House Press Secretary Tony Snow told reporters.
Former President Clinton, who spent his final hours in office pardoning 140 people, including fugitive financier Marc Rich, took a swipe at Bush on Tuesday for exempting Libby from a 30-month prison sentence. Libby was convicted of lying to investigators probing the leak of a CIA employee’s name.
“They believe that they should be able to do what they want to do and that the law is a minor obstacle,” Clinton told a radio interviewer.
His wife, Sen. Hillary Clinton, who is running for president, said Bush’s commutation of Libby’s sentence “was clearly an effort to protect the White House.”
“Libby was carrying out the implicit or explicit wishes of the vice president — or maybe the president as well — in the further effort to stifle dissent,” the New York Democrat said.
White House spokesman Scott Stanzel said he was shocked by the Clintons’ remarks.
“Whenyou think about the previous administration and the eleventh-hour fire-sale pardons,” he said, “it’s really startling that they have the gall to criticize.”
Clinton’s last-day pardons included Rich; convicted Whitewater figure Susan McDougal; and the president’s brother, Roger Clinton, who had been convicted of drug charges. Clinton also pardoned a drug trafficker.
In 1999, Clinton commuted the sentences of 16 members of FALN, a Puerto Rican terrorist group that carried out 120 bomb attacks against U.S. targets.
In 2000, he pardoned Edgar and Vonna Jo Gregory, who had been convicted of bank fraud, after being lobbied by Tony Rodham, Hillary’s brother, who worked for the Gregorys.
Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., has called for hearings on Bush’s commutation of Libby’s sentence.
“Well, fine, knock himself out,” Snow said. “I mean, perfectly happy. And while he’s at it, why doesn’t he look at Jan. 20th, 2001 [when Bush became president]?”
