President Supports Gonzales Despite Calls for Resignation

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• GWEN IFILL:

  We begin with the crisis of confidence in Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

  GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS, "This Week" Anchor: Do you think you let him down?

• GWEN IFILL:

  Making the round of morning news programs today, embattled Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said he had no plans to resign.

• ALBERTO GONZALES, U.S. Attorney General:

  Ultimately, I serve at the pleasure of the president of the United States. That will be a decision for the president to make.

• GWEN IFILL:

  But a congressional outcry continued, as Democratic leaders said Gonzales misled them and oversaw the politically motivated firings of eight U.S. attorneys last year.

  SEN. HARRY REID (D-NV), Senate Majority Leader: Never in history of the country has anything like this ever happened. What is done is untoward, it's wrong, it's unethical, it's immoral, I believe it's illegal, and Gonzales should be fired.

• GWEN IFILL:

  President Bush, wrapping up a trip to Latin America, admitted he was unhappy with the way the Justice Department handled the matter, but said he will stand by his longtime friend, "Al."

  GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States: What Al did was and what the Justice Department did was appropriate. U.S. attorneys serve at the pleasure of the president. In other words, they're appointed by the president. They can be removed by the president. What was mishandled was the explanation of the case.

• GWEN IFILL:

  Justice Department officials initially claimed the U.S. attorneys, who appeared on Capitol Hill last week, were dismissed for poor performance. They insisted no White House staff was involved in the decision.

  But 150 pages of e-mails released this week showed a two-year pattern of correspondence between Gonzales' chief of staff, Kyle Sampson, and former White House counsel Harriet Miers about the firings. Sampson stepped down as chief of staff late Monday. Miers left the White House in January.

  In one memo, Sampson recommended retaining those who had "exhibited loyalty to the president," and recommended removing those attorneys who had "chafed against administration initiatives."

  Of Carol Lam, the U.S. attorney representing San Diego, Sampson asked in one e-mail whether the deputy attorney general's office has "ever called Carol Lam and woodshedded her regarding immigration enforcement."

  At last week's hearing, Lam discussed the call she got from a Justice Department official last December.

• CAROL LAM, Former U.S. Attorney, California:

  He indicated that the Department of Justice wanted to thank me for my years of service and that they wanted to take my office in a different direction. I asked for — and that they would like my resignation, effective Jan. 31.

• GWEN IFILL:

  Sampson also wrote in his e-mails about a plan to replace Arkansas U.S. attorney Bud Cummins with a former aide to White House adviser Karl Rove. Sampson wrote the move "was important to Harriet, Karl, et cetera."

  The Bush administration has laid much of the blame for the scandal on Sampson for allowing Justice Department officials to repeatedly tell Congress that the firings were not coordinated with the White House.

• ALBERTO GONZALES:

  I relied upon my chief of staff to drive this process, in terms of evaluating where we could make improvements in districts. I relied upon my chief of staff to ensure that people who are communicating to the Hill had all the appropriate information to make sure that the communications to the Hill were complete and were accurate. And, in that sense, I could have done a better job.

• GWEN IFILL:

  Gonzales is scheduled to return to Capitol Hill to answer questions from congressional leaders later this week.