Today, Bush announced his “nomination of retired federal judge Michael B. Mukasey to become the nation’s 81st attorney general, moving to install a law-and-order conservative at the Justice Department to help wage the war on terrorism while hoping to avoid a confirmation fight with Senate Democrats.”

Calling Mukasey “clear-eyed about the threat our nation faces,” Bush said his nominee “knows what it takes to fight this war effectively, and he knows how to do it in a manner that’s consistent with our laws and our Constitution.”

In an appearance with Bush at a brief announcement ceremony in the White House Rose Garden, Mukasey, 66, said the Justice Department “faces challenges vastly different from those it faced when I was an assistant U.S. attorney 35 years ago.” But he said the “principles that guide the department remain the same: to pursue justice by enforcing the law with unswerving fidelity to the Constitution.”

Senator John Kerry issued the following statement today, in response to President Bush’s nomination of Judge Michael Mukasey to be the nation’s 81st Attorney General:

“It’s welcome news that the White House seems to have listened to Americans who are tired of being divided along ideological lines, and appears to have chosen in Judge Mukasey someone without a lot of the partisan baggage that has tarnished the last two attorney generals in this administration,” Kerry said. “I am optimistic that Judge Mukasey has the background and independent record needed to restore credibility to the Justice Department. I am hopeful he will work with Congress instead of against it as we continue the open investigations into improper conduct in the Department. I will withhold final judgment until after the Senate confirmation hearings but I am heartened that the Administration appears to have found a candidate who will not put party loyalty over the rule of law.”

TPM and The Anonymous Liberal have more on the pick and TIME notes that Bush’s choice “Irritates the Right“:

If the administration was trying to avoid a fight with the left over the confirmation of Alberto Gonzales’ replacement as Attorney General, they may have succeeded with the nomination of former New York district judge, Michael Mukasey. The question now is whether they’ll have a fight with the right. Both in Mukasey himself, and in the process by which he picked him, Bush has gone against the right, spurning their favored choice, engaging with — and conceding to — Democrats, and naming a New Yorker who is an unknown quantity on many of the social issues about which they care most deeply.

Filed under: Bush Admin, Congress, Democrats, In The News, John Kerry, Politics, Republicans, Senate | Get Permalink or trackback |