Peter Keisler

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Acting Attorney General of the United States
Peter D. Keisler

In office September 18, 2007 – November 9, 2007
President	George W. Bush
Preceded by	Paul Clement, act.
Succeeded by	Michael Mukasey

Born	October 13, 1960 Hempstead, New York
Political party	Republican
Profession	Lawyer
Religion	Judaism

Peter D. Keisler (born October 13, 1960 in Hempstead, New York) is an American lawyer who has become embroiled in controversy following his 2006 nomination by President George W. Bush to the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. Presently a partner at the firm of Sidley Austin in Washington, D.C., he formerly was the Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Civil Division at the U.S. Department of Justice. Upon the resignation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, until November 9, 2007, he was also the Acting Attorney General of the United States.

1 Biography
2 Nomination as federal judge
3 See also
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Biography

Keisler went to Yale both for undergraduate and law school. As an undergraduate, Keisler was the Chairman of the Party of the Right and the Speaker of the Yale Political Union. He graduated magna cum laude from Yale College in 1981 and then entered Yale Law School. In 1982, he helped to co-found the Federalist Society, a conservative thinktank [1]. He received his J.D. in 1985. After law school, Keisler clerked for Judge Robert Bork on the D.C. Circuit from 1985 to 1986. After this clerkship, he joined the Office of Legal Counsel under President Ronald Reagan. There, he worked on both the Supreme Court nominations of his former boss, Robert Bork, and the man who replaced Bork, Anthony Kennedy. After Kennedy was confirmed, he hired Keisler to be one of his four law clerks during his first year on the Court in 1988. One of his fellow clerks during that year was Miguel Estrada, another conservative nominee to the D.C. Circuit whose nomination was controversially filibustered by the Democrats in 2003.

After finishing his Supreme Court clerkship, Mr. Keisler became a partner in the Washington, D.C. office of Sidley Austin. He specialized in general and appellate litigation and telecommunications law, and argued before the Supreme Court and numerous federal Courts of Appeals. In 2002, he left his job in order to join the Department of Justice. He joined the Department on June 24, 2002, as the Principal Deputy Associate Attorney General and Acting Associate Attorney General.

Peter Keisler was sworn in as the Civil Division's Assistant Attorney General on July 1, 2003. In that capacity, most of his legal work was clearly dictated by his role as head of a component obligated to defend government policies and statutes. Consistent with this role, Mr. Keisler was involved in defending the Bush Administration’s policies in the Global War on Terror. He has also represented the government in defense of laws protecting access to abortion clinics and imposing requirements on telemarketing companies^[1].

In probably the most well-known case he handled, Keisler argued on behalf of the government in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld in the D.C. Circuit and participated in both the case's appellate and Supreme Court briefs^[2]. In addition, he personally led the team that responded to a legal appeal by Sabin Willett, the lawyer for the seventeen remaining Uyghur captives in Guantanamo^[3], that tested the use of a provision of the Detainee Treatment Act in terms of whether or not captives could challenge the rulings of their Combatant Status Review Tribunals.

On September 6, 2007, Keisler announced his resignation from the Department of Justice in order to "spend time with his family."^[4]^[5] On September 17, 2007, President Bush announced that Keisler had agreed to remain at the Department of Justice as Acting Attorney General until the Senate confirmation of a new Attorney General; Bush also announced the nomination of Michael Mukasey for Attorney General at the same time.^[6] On March 18, 2008, it was announced that Keisler would be returning to his former position as a partner of Sidley Austin as a global coordinator of the firm’s appellate practice in its Washington, D.C. office^[7].

[edit] Nomination as federal judge

Originally, Keisler, a resident of Bethesda, Maryland, was considered for a Maryland seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit during the spring of 2001. Maryland's two Democratic senators, Paul Sarbanes and Barbara Mikulski, however, blocked the White House from making the nomination on the grounds that Keisler did not have strong enough Maryland "roots"^[8].

Keisler was later nominated for a position on the DC Circuit on June 29, 2006 by President George W. Bush to fill a seat vacated by John Roberts, whom Bush appointed Chief Justice of the United States in 2005. At the time, the 109th Senate was controlled by the Republican Party. On August 1, 2006, he received a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee. The Senate on September 29, 2006 returned the nomination to the President without acting on it, prior to adjourning for the 2006 elections, on September 30, 2006.^[9] After the 2006 midterm Congressional elections (in which the Democrats prospectively reclaimed control of the Senate for the next coming 110th congressional session), President Bush renominated Keisler on November 15, 2006. The Senate returned the nomination to Bush on December 9, 2006 without acting on the nomination, before the 109th Congress's final adjournment. President Bush renominated Keisler on January 9, 2007 for consideration by the Senate during the 110th Congress. The 110th Senate has not acted upon this nomination.^[10]

It is reported that the Democrats in the Senate do not want to confirm Keisler for four basic reasons. First, he is a co-founder of the Federalist Society, a conservative legal group which many Democrats see as seeking to control the federal judiciary. He was on its board of directors from 1983 until 2000. Second, he clerked for Robert Bork, a former judge whose nomination to the Supreme Court was embroiled in controversy before being rejected by the Senate. Third, during his tenure at the DOJ, he was instrumental in defending some of the most controversial policies of Republican President George W. Bush concerning the Global War on Terror.^[11] Finally, he is seen as being a possible Republican nominee to the Supreme Court.^[12]