On Tuesday, appearing on MSNBC with host Chris Hayes and Matt Miller, the chief spokesman for the Department of Justice for the Obama Administration, former Attorney General Eric Holder, confessed he was thinking of running for president in 2020.
Hayes gestured to Holder, “I’m not sure I’ll get the most honest answer from you if I ask this question, so I’ll ask you (turning to Miller): Is he running for president? Is Eric Holder running for president?”
Miller replied, “I keep asking him because I want to know if I have to quit my job and move to Iowa …”
Holder interrupted, “If he will promise to be my press secretary I might consider it.
Hayes asked, “You are considering it?”
Holder answered, “Yeah, I’m thinking about it but I’ve not made any determinations. I’m focusing on the work I’m doing with the National Democratic Redistricting Committee and trying to deal with gerrymandering.”
Holder did his share of fantasizing during the interview, at one point insisting, “Given the power that the attorney general has, the ability to deprive people of their liberty, the ability to actually execute people, that power has to be used in a way that is independent of any political influence. And so, on a day-to-day basis, we made sure that we made our decisions on the basis of the law and the facts without any consideration of what the White House wanted us to do.”
Really. As Hans A. von Spakovsky, who co-authored “Obama’s Enforcer: Eric Holder’s Justice Department” with John Fund, has written, “Every time President Obama has broken, bent, ignored or changed the law, the person at his side advising him how to do it has been Eric Holder.” He added:
Mr. Holder is the first attorney general in history to be held in contempt by the House of Representatives. He earned this dubious distinction by refusing to turn over documents related to what may be the most reckless law enforcement operation ever undertaken by the Justice Department: Operation Fast and Furious.
During his tenure, the Justice Department launched more investigations and prosecutions of leaks than all prior attorneys general combined, while studiously ignoring high-level “friendly leaks” by White House officials designed to make the president look tough in the fight against terrorism.
The idea of Holder running for president elicited this tweet, which pretty much sums it up: