National

White House, Congress in Talks on Attorney Firings

By Liane Hansen, Don Gonyea

Published March 18, 2007 at 5:00 AM PDT

This story was published more than 17 years ago.

Congressional Democrats are demanding more information about the dismissals of eight U.S. attorneys last year. The Bush administration has insisted that the firings were not politically motivated.

After a week of sometimes conflicting explanations from the White House and the Justice Department, there are now questions about whether Attorney General Alberto Gonzales can survive politically. And if Congress has its way, some top Bush administration officials will face tough questions as well.

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Liane Hansen

Liane Hansen has been the host of NPR's award-winning Weekend Edition Sunday for 20 years. She brings to her position an extensive background in broadcast journalism, including work as a radio producer, reporter, and on-air host at both the local and national level. The program has covered such breaking news stories as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the capture of Saddam Hussein, the deaths of Princess Diana and John F. Kennedy, Jr., and the Columbia shuttle tragedy. In 2004, Liane was granted an exclusive interview with former weapons inspector David Kay prior to his report on the search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. The show also won the James Beard award for best radio program on food for a report on SPAM.

Don Gonyea

You're most likely to find NPR's Don Gonyea on the road, in some battleground state looking for voters to sit with him at the local lunch spot, the VFW or union hall, at a campaign rally, or at their kitchen tables to tell him what's on their minds. Through countless such conversations over the course of the year, he gets a ground-level view of American elections. Gonyea is NPR's National Political Correspondent, a position he has held since 2010. His reports can be heard on all NPR News programs and at NPR.org. To hear his sound-rich stories is akin to riding in the passenger seat of his rental car, traveling through Iowa or South Carolina or Michigan or wherever, right along with him.