Jamie S. Gorelick (born May 6, 1950) was the number two official in the U.S. Department of Justice during the Clinton administration. She was appointed by Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle to serve as a commissioner on the bipartisan National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, which sought to investigate the circumstances leading up to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. May 6 is the 126th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (127th in leap years). ... 1950 (MCML) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will take you to calendar). ... DOJ headquarters in Washington, D.C. Justice Department redirects here. ... Order: 42nd President Term of Office: January 20, 1993–January 20, 2001 Preceded by: George H. W. Bush Succeeded by: George W. Bush Date of birth: August 19, 1946 Place of birth: Hope, Arkansas Date of death: Place of death: First Lady: Hillary Rodham Clinton Political party: Democratic Vice President... Thomas Andrew Daschle (born December 9, 1947), known as Tom Daschle, was a U.S. Senator from South Dakota and the Senate Majority Leader. ... The Commissions seal The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, also known as the 9/11 Commission, was set up in late 2002 to prepare a full and complete account of the circumstances surrounding the September 11, 2001 attacks including preparedness for and the immediate response... The explosion resulting from the crashing of United Airlines Flight 175 into the South Tower. ...

Critics say her duties on the commission represent a conflict of interest, contending that she is the single greatest cause of the organizational failures within intelligence that contributed to the September 11, 2001 attacks. Gorelick's defenders say she is the victim of a partisan political smear. September 11 is the 254th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (255th in leap years). ... 2001: A Space Odyssey. ...

Gorelick's critics have accused Gorelick of helping to construct a barrier between federal agents and agencies that kept vital intelligence on terror theats from being shared. According to Former Attorney General John Ashcroft Gorelick helped establish the "single greatest structural cause" for Sept. 11, which was "the wall that segregated criminal investigators and intelligence agents," See original Gorelick memo: [1].

However, the report from the 9/11 Commission asserts that the 'wall' limiting the ability of federal agencies to cooperate had existed since the 80's and is in fact not one singular wall but a series of restrictions passed over the course of over twenty years. All members of the 9/11 Commission agreed that Gorelick played no significant role in damaging information sharing on terrorist activities.

ORIGINS OF THE WALL

During the Nixon Administation, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Central Intelligence Agency were used to spy on Nixon's domestic political critics.

"Our experience has been that the FBI labels of an investigation as intelligence or law enforcement can be quite arbitrary, depending upon the personnel involved and that the most effective way to combat terrorism is with as few labels and walls as possible so that wherever permissible, the right and left hands are communicating," wrote Ms. White.

But Gorelick ignored this advice and went to great lengths to exceed the intent of legal precedent. A Gorelick 1995 memorandum states that the procedures her memorandum put in place "go beyond what is legally required...[to] prevent any risk of creating an unwarranted appearance that FISA is being used to avoid procedural safeguards which would apply in a criminal investigation." (Emphasis added.) The wall intentionally exceeded the requirements of FISA and then-existing federal case law. , Upon her selection to the commission, Ms. Gorelick not only did not recuse herself, but had not mentioned her own role in preventing law enforcement from sharing information about terrorist activities. Attorney General Ashcorft was incensed before the 9/11 commission to learn that the commission had not investigated or been told of Gorelick's memo or her role in overzealous enforcement of any notion of the "wall". This assertion was disputed by former senator Slade Gorton (R-WA), a member of the 9-11 Commission, who said, "nothing Jamie Gorelick wrote had the slightest impact on the Department of Defense or its willingness or ability to share intelligence information with other intelligence agencies." Gorton also asserted that "the wall" was a long-standing policy that had resulted from the Church committee in the 1970s, and that the policy only prohibits transfer of certain information from prosecutors to the intelligence services and never prohibited information flowing in the opposite direction.

Testifying before the commission, Attorney General Ashcroft said, "Although you understand the debilitating impact of the wall, I cannot imagine that the commission knew about this memorandum, so I have declassified it for you and the public to review," he said. "Full disclosure compels me to inform you that its author is a member of this commission." For his outspoken manner and his support for the Patriot Act, many liberals defended Ms. Gorelick by calling Ashcroft a "fascist".

As the No. 2 person in the Clinton Justice Department, Ms. Gorelick was also instrumental in implementing prison privatization and policies supporting increases in US prison populations. See Dillon, Read & Co. Inc and the Aristocracy of Prison Profits [2]

Gorelick served as Vice Chairman of the Federal National Mortgage Association from 1997 to 2003. Before serving as Deputy Attorney General of the United States, she was General Counsel of the Department of Defense and a prominent attorney with the firm of Miller, Cassidy, Larroca & Lewin. She also served as an assistant to the U.S. Secretary of Energy from 1979 to 1980. The federal government of the United States created the Federal National Mortgage Association (FNMA) (NYSE: FNM), commonly known as Fannie Mae, in 1938 to establish a secondary market for mortgages insured by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA). ... 1997 (MCMXCVII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... 2003 (MMIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Gorelick was president of the District of Columbia Bar from 1992 to 1993. She is currently a law partner in the Washington office of WilmerHale and a non-executive director of the oilfield services provider Schlumberger Ltd.

External links

• Gorelick's Wall, Opinion Journal (Wall Street Journal 4/15/04)

Members of the 9/11 Commission

Kean (Chair) • Hamilton (Vice chair) Ben-Veniste • Fielding • Gorelick • Gorton • Kerrey • Lehman • Roemer • Thompson The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, also known as the 9/11 Commission, was set up in late 2002 to prepare a full and complete account of the circumstances surrounding the September 11, 2001 attacks including preparedness for and the immediate response to the attacks. ... Logo of the 9-11 Commission. ... Thomas Howard Kean (born April 21, 1935 in New York City) is an American Republican Party politician, who served as the 48th Governor of New Jersey, from 1982 to 1990. ... Lee Herbert Hamilton (1931 - ) was born in Daytona Beach, Volusia County, Fla, in the United States. ... Richard Ben-Veniste (born January 3, 1943), a member of the 9-11 Commission, is known for his pointed questions and criticisms of members of both the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations. ... Fred Fisher Fielding (born March 21, 1939) is senior partner at Wiley, Rein, & Fielding, a Washington, D.C. law firm. ... Slade Gorton Thomas Slade Gorton III (born January 8, 1928) is an American politician. ... Senator Bob Kerrey Joseph Robert Kerrey (born August 27, 1943) was Governor of Nebraska from 1983 to 1987, and a U.S. Senator from Nebraska (1989–2001) and a Democrat. ... John F. Lehman, Jr. ... Timothy J. Roemer is president of the Center for National Policy (CNP) and a distinguished scholar at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, a non-profit research and educational institution dedicated to improving public policy outcomes. ... James Robert Thompson (born May 8, 1936), also known as Big Jim Thompson, was the longest-serving Governor of the U.S. state of Illinois. ...