Eric Holder’s hidden agenda

"This is an administration that is determined to conduct itself by the rule of law. And to the extent that we receive lawful requests from an appropriately created court, we would obviously respond to it."

It was springtime in Berlin and Eric Holder, a well-known "rule of law" devotee, was speaking to the German press. He’d been asked if his Justice Department would cooperate with efforts by foreign or international tribunals to prosecute U.S. government officials who carried out the Bush administration’s post-9/11 counterterrorism policies. The attorney general assured listeners that he was certainly open to being helpful. "Obviously," he said, "we would look at any request that would come from a court in any country and see how and whether we should comply with it."

As the Associated Press reported at the time, Holder was "pressed on whether that meant the United States would cooperate with a foreign court prosecuting Bush administration officials." He skirted the question in a way Americans ought to find alarming. The attorney general indicated that he was speaking only about "evidentiary requests." Translation: The Obama administration will not make arrests and hand current or former American government officials over for foreign trials, but if the Europeans or U.N. functionaries (at the nudging of, say, the Organization of the Islamic Conference) want Justice’s help gathering evidence in order to build triable cases – count us in.

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Andy McCarthy was the 2008 recipient of the Center’s Mightier Pen Award.