Feinstein Faces Dem Censure After Backing Mukasey

One day after voting to elevate a divisive conservative judge to the federal appeals court in New Orleans, California Sen. Dianne Feinstein was the president's guest aboard Air Force One. She had been invited to survey the damage from the recent spate of Southern California wildfires.

The senator later remarked privately that she found her conversation with Bush aboard Air Force One "illuminating," a source close to Feinstein told the Huffington Post.

Two weeks later, Feinstein was one of two Democrats on the Senate judiciary committee to vote to send Michael Mukasey's nomination to be the new attorney general to the full Senate. Her support helped turn the tide in favor of a nomination that faced an uncertain future after Mukasey refused to say whether waterboarding was torture.

When the full Senate voted, Feinstein was one of only six Democrats to vote in favor of confirming Mukasey.

Now, a coalition of progressive Democrats upset with Feinstein's controversial votes will ask the California Democratic Party to censure her at its executive board meeting this weekend, the Huffington Post has learned.

The move comes as Feinstein again finds herself under fire for saying Thursday that she now supports granting legal immunity to telecom companies that shared customer email and phone messages with the federal government as part of the warrantless surveillance program.

"Dianne Feinstein does not listen to the people of California," said Rick Jacobs, president of the Courage Campaign, a progressive organization in California. "She supports George Bush's agenda time after time."

Feinstein's office did not respond to messages seeking comment.

Story continues below

advertisement

East Bay For Democracy, a chartered Democratic Club outside San Francisco, will introduce the censure motion on Saturday at the state party's executive board meeting in Anaheim. The Governing Board of the Progressive Caucus of the California Democratic Party and the Progressive Democrats of America are also backing the measure.

In addition to her move to back Mukasey, critics have lashed out at her decision last month to vote to confirm Judge Leslie Southwick to the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in New Orleans. Southwick's opponents charged that his record on the bench in Mississippi demonstrated that he was both racist and homophobic. The Congressional Black Caucus, Human Rights Campaign and People for the American Way opposed his nomination.

The censure resolution faces an uphill battle. In order to be considered by the full executive board, it must first make it through the party's resolutions committee, which must approve the text unanimously.

The text of the resolution is below:

Whereas Senator Dianne Feinstein voted to support the nomination of Judge Michael Mukasey as United States Attorney General, thereby elevating to the highest position in law enforcement a man who refused to renounce the right of the President to resort to torture and who refused to recognize waterboarding as a form of torture, and by this action Senator Feinstein failed to oppose President Bush and failed to stand for the ideals of the Democratic Party, which abhors torture and stands firmly against its use by the United States at all times and places; and

Whereas Senator Feinstein voted to confirm Judge Leslie Southwick for a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit despite his clear record of racism and gender discrimination, thus failing to stand firmly with the Democratic Party, which supports gender equality and opposes racism in any of its manifestations; and

Whereas these examples are far from the only instances where Senator Feinstein, after seeking and securing the support and endorsement of the California Democratic Party, has failed to support the policies and principles of our party

Therefore be it resolved that the California Democratic Party expresses its disappointment at, and censure of, Senator Feinstein for ignoring Democratic principles and falling so far below the standard of what we expect of our elected officials.

Comments

[dantheman]

Our democracy is under assault from all sides. We the American people must reclaim our power from the special interests. Peaceably if possible, if not...

[Manx]

Dianne Feinstein is Lieberman in drag.

[lip11]

Feinstein is a treasonous traitor. I'm from CA and she'll never get my vote.

[Waitaminute]

These people act as if bush is the Omen.Prince of darkness. Isn't this devil suppose to be dumb?

Did you see both Dems and repubs act as if he was God almighty, when he entered the floor of the house in 2004, just before that years state of the union address? They were reaching over one another, grabbing for his hand.

If you saw that, you'd know most of our politicians are playing a lot of us for SUCKERS. Censure, for what? This B is rich and probably want run again anyway. She could care less about some puny censure.

The only other explanation besides them being sellouts (paidoff)are, they are being blackmailed or threatened.

[ranch111]

God, I'm wondering what Feinstein found so illuminating? This is ponderous.

[Noelle]

Diane Feinstein and her husband Richard C Blum are war profiteers, period.

While Diane Feinstein sat on the Senate Military Construction Appropriations Subcommittee she approved BILLIONS of government contracts to her own husband's companies, all while doing nothing for the welfare of veterans who the committee was also overseeing.

At the start of the Iraq war her husband's defense company URS Corp. was awarded a contract worth 3.1 billion over eight years and 2 months later another contract worth 600 million. This is after URS Corp. brought in 2.4 billion in revenue in 2002. The personal wealth of The Feinstein family has gone up 40 million dollars since Bush came into office.

There is nothing Democratic about the activities of our so called "leaders" over the past 6 and a half years. From the Bush Administration, Defense Contractors and Haliburton to PNAC Members, Wallstreet, Bankers and our Congress, it has been nothing but a heist, a robbery. Probably the largest heist in the history of the world. I don't think a small group of people have ever made so much money in such a short period of time and all on the backs of American Taxpayers and Dead Soldiers.

If you beleive it's just republicans and neocons profiteering you are either blind or just don't want to see it.

There isn't a dark enough place in hell for these people.

[clancy11]

Please, go for censure! The woman has
been bought and sold to the Bush team.

[renoir]

Listen. Senator Feinstein has rocked my cheerful activist world with this one vote. Does this really signal that no one is beyond corruption, that They will do everything they can to advance their power grab and that We The People have been laughably delusional when we thought that anything we want or need our elected officials to accomplish means anything to them? Please express your dismay by writing a letter in support of censure to the California Democratic Party (the executive committee is meeting this weekend)... because when all is said and done, I guess, I still believe that WE can wrest control from these fascists. Write to: [e-mail]

[deweym]

So the question is if her allegiance is not to the Constitution or the Democratic people that elected her, (which she has clearly demonstrated by supporting Mukasey and giving the telcos a free pass, where do her loyalties lay? There are only two (2) possible answers:

Option 1: Israel
Option 2: Her husbands defense contracts

[SILVANUS]

She has always been a whore.

Old Sicilian saying: What's born round does not pass away square.

[Waitaminute]

Mrs, feinstein and Pelose are not good examples of women in leadership or decision making positions. They are an insult. They sold out just as quickly as the men.

[BarryChamplain]

Might I humbly suggest that, if they're not already on board with this, the large mainstream progressive groups who opposed the Southwick nomination... the Congressional Black Caucus, Human Rights Campaign and People for the American Way... be approached to add THEIR $.02 to the measure?

[SouthpawSass]

Okay, so Daddy Bush has some dirt on Feinstein. He tells little Bush. Little Bush then tells Feinstein that if she doesn't vote in favor of his guy, her dirty deed will get leaked to the press. Feinstein knows he'll do it 'cause little Bush is a dirty player... With her career/reputation on the line, she breaks. Too add more salt to the wound, Little Bush tells Feinstein if she doesn't talk to her... let's just call him her "collegue", his career/reputation will be destroyed as well.

Hence, two Democrats vote in favor of Mukasey.

Phew, detective work is sooo tiring.

[Rubbernoze]

Censure doesn't go far enough. She should be expelled from the Democratic party! Can a U.S. Senator be recalled and replaced in the middle of a term? Feinstein is a disgrace!

[gallo146]

It's about time that California Sen. Dianne Feinstein be expulsed from the Democratic party. She is a neocon in Democrap clothes. she should switch parties to the Terripublican Party.