The Investigations Begin: Holder on the Hot Seat in Black Panther Case

New Congressional leaders have begun their investigations into the most potent scandal facing the Obama administration, one that seems destined to expose injustice at the highest levels of government. Rep. Lamar Smith, R-TX, the new chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, has opened a probe into the Justice Department’s handling of the Black Panther case in a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder. Smith is looking into whether the case’s dismissal, and the underlying culture of the department’s Voting Rights division, show a decision to deny justice to a broad category of Americans based on race.

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Smith singled out the another reported refusal by Fernandes [Julie Fernandes, Obama’s Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights] in his letter: an alleged determination not to enforce a provision of the National Voter Registration Act (known as the “Motor Voter Law”) requiring localities to purge the voting rolls of dead and ineligible voters. Smith asked if Fernandes opted to “explicitly or implicitly direct Voting Section staff not to enforce any section of any federal rights statute.”

Fernandes seems to have admitted as much in public. Discussing that specific section, she publicly stated, “We have no interest in enforcing this provision of the law. It has nothing to do with increasing turnout, and we are just not going to do it.”

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Congress similarly has the duty to determine where this policy originated, and whether officials who publicly deny its existence are guilty of perjury or obstruction of justice. Thomas Perez, the Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division, testified on May 14 that the decision to drop the case was simply “a case of career people disagreeing with career people,” and that no “political leadership involved in the decision not to pursue this particular case.” However, the watchdog group Judicial Watch has uncovered proof of significant political involvement in lobbying on behalf of the Panthers. Did Perez commit perjury? If so, how high did the political pressure go? Who handed down the decision to dispense race-based “justice”? How high does the cover-up of this decision reach? Namely, did the attorney general or the president of the United States himself suborn perjury?

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