Press release: “Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Wednesday issued a subpoena to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales (6 pages, PDF) compelling the Department of Justice to provide all Karl Rove e-mails in its possession related to the panel’s ongoing investigation into the mass firings of federal prosecutors. Rove, a senior political advisor to President Bush, and the White House political operation — which Rove heads – have been linked to the project that resulted in the unprecedented firings of several well-performing federal prosecutors, according to information gathered by the Committee through documents, interviews and testimony. Several of the dismissed prosecutors have testified under oath and said in public that they were unaware of performance problems and believe political influence was a factor in their firings. Leahy requested the e-mails first at the Committee’s oversight hearing with the Attorney General on April 19, 2007, and then again in a letter to the Attorney General on April 25, 2007. The Attorney General has failed to respond to those earlier requests.”