Position:Attorney General
The Attorney General is the head of the Department of Justice and the chief law enforcement officer of the Federal government. They also give legal advice and opinions to the president. The attorney general has an important role to play in defining the activities undertaken in the name of national security, as issues such as domestic wiretapping and terrorism detainee treatment has made clear. The attorney general appointment must be confirmed by the Senate.
Relevant Professional Background: Holder began working for the U.S. Justice Department immediately after graduation from Yale Law School in 1976. He served as a judge in the District of Columbia Superior Court during the Reagan administration. In 1997, he was promoted to Deputy Attorney General under President Clinton. In 2001, he moved to the firm Covington & Burling in Washington D.C. In 2007, he became one of Obama's close campaign advisors, and he was one of a small team consulted on Obama's vice presidential selection. Over the course of his career, Holder has made a number of controversial decisions that are likely to create some dissension among Senate members in his confirmation hearings.
Positions: Holder is not known as a particularly partisan figure; he has been appointed to service by both Reagan and Clinton. His legal positions on war on terror issues contain shades of gray. He has been critical of Guantanamo Bay and supports its closure. When he was interviewed in 2004, however, he offered that those who were captured were not prisoners of war, and therefore not entitled to Geneva Convention protections. In the interview, Holder makes it fairly clear he believes those who were detained were Al Qaeda members, which is likely to have shaped his view. He has also been highly critical of the Patriot Act for promoting unconstitutional behavior by law enforcement.
Holder's views on privacy and civil liberties, which will come into play when the DoJ addresses issues such as surveillance and data mininng, are similiarly nuanced. A CNET News analysis of Holder's positions when he worked in the Clinton administration showed that "in some cases, Holder's statements echoed the position of Justice Department staff members or political appointees, many of whom clashed with civil liberties groups. In others, the former deputy attorney general seems to have gone further than his colleagues in advocating more powers for police."
Read more: Glenn Greenwald discusses Eric Holder's positions | Republican National Committee Head Weighs In | The Nation: The Trouble with Eric HolderChallenges:
Holder, if confirmed, will be the head of a department whose reputation has been compromised in the last eight years by either overly political actions, as when former AG Gonzalez fired eight prosecutors he did not see as loyal enough to the Bush administration, or for providing legal sanction for unconstitutional behavior. Holder will have to re-establish the internal morale of the department as well as public and congressional trust that the Department is sufficiently independent from the president.
Holder will have to face how to address elements of the PATRIOT Act that may be unconstitutional. The PATRIOT Act is a diverse set of laws that aims to "deter and punish terrorist acts in the United States and around the world" and to "enhance law enforcement investigatory tools." It passed shortly after the September 11 attacks, and modified and reauthorized in 2006. While some of its excesses were reduced in the reauthorized act, others remain contentious. The degree of freedom law enforcement has to gather information about U.S. citizens is one of the most controversial.
A last area that the Department of Justice will address relates to the treatment of aliens detained as potential terrorism suspects. Plans are already underway for the United States to close Guantanamo Bay, but the disposition of current and future detainees has not yet been determined.
Learn more about: The PATRIOT Act and Civil Liberties | Guantanamo Bay | Privacy after 9/11