AUSTIN
— Gov. Rick Perry of Texas was indicted on two felony counts on Friday
by a state grand jury examining his handling of a local district
attorney’s drunken driving arrest and the state financing for a public
corruption unit under the lawyer’s control.
The indictment was returned late Friday in Austin.
The
investigation centered on Mr. Perry’s veto power as governor. His
critics asserted that he used that power as leverage to try to get an
elected official and influential Democrat — Rosemary Lehmberg, the
district attorney in Travis County — to step down after her arrest for
drunken driving last year. Ms. Lehmberg is Austin’s top prosecutor and
oversees a powerful public corruption unit that investigates state,
local and federal officials; its work led to the 2005 indictment of a
former Republican congressman, Tom DeLay on charges of violating
campaign finance laws.
Following
Ms. Lehmberg’s arrest, Mr. Perry and his aides threatened to veto $7.5
million in state dollars for the public corruption unit in her office
unless she resigned. The governor followed through on his threat,
vetoing the money by stating that he could not support “continued state
funding for an office with statewide jurisdiction at a time when the
person charged with ultimate responsibility of that unit has lost the
public’s confidence.”
Has Rick Perry done anything amounting to abuse of power?
ReplyDeleteBy asking a person who'd been arrested for drunk driving to step down? And by resorting to other means to force her to step down?
That may well be, but what are we to say of practically ALL cops in the country?
What are we to say of most judges?
What are we to say of that queer-looking jerk golfing and shitting in the White House?
If Perry went after her for political reasons, he deserves to get prosecuted.
ReplyDeleteBut pressuring an official who is heading up a unit on public integrity to resign because of a DUI conviction is pretty logical. If she refused to step down than spending more money on her unit would be a waste of funds. He was not trying to cover anything up. Let the grand jury do its work, the case shows the system is working as it should.