Bush’s Pick for Solicitor General Is Deadlocked

Senate Democrats threw into jeopardy Thursday one of President Bush’s top picks for the Justice Department in a confirmation battle that has revived lingering resentment from the Clinton era.

The Senate Judiciary Committee split, 9 to 9, along party lines on whether to recommend solicitor general nominee Theodore B. Olson as the government’s top litigator before the Supreme Court. Under the new power-sharing arrangement in the evenly split Senate, Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.) can--if Republicans remain united--effectively break the tie and bring Olson’s nomination to the Senate floor.

But the potential for gridlock still looms in a confirmation fight that is shaping up as a smaller-scale version of the messy debate over Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft’s nomination.

Republicans claimed that the no votes cast by all nine Democrats on the judiciary committee are political “payback” because Olson represented GOP candidate George W. Bush before the U.S. Supreme Court in December in the case that helped decide the presidential election.

But Democrats insist their concerns have less to do with Olson’s advocacy for Bush than with his attacks on former President Clinton.

They allege that Olson, a former Los Angeles attorney and stalwart legal mind among conservatives, may have played a bigger role than he has acknowledged in digging up dirt on Clinton in the mid-1990s, and they are upset that the Republicans have refused to fully investigate the allegations.

“Mr. Olson’s next client will be the United States of America, and I want someone I can have confidence in . . . , not someone who’s playing word games,” said Sen. Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, who led the attack against Olson.

As solicitor general, Olson would be responsible for shaping and often personally arguing federal cases before the Supreme Court. The post is often known as “the 10th justice” because of its critical role as a fixture before the high court.

The nomination has drawn close scrutiny because the sharply conservative views of Olson and Ashcroft have generated questions about whether they would seek to steer the court farther to the right on issues such as abortion rights and affirmative action.

Two other nominees for top Justice Department posts--Assistant Attys. Gen. Michael Chertoff and Viet D. Dinh--sailed through the Committee by 18-0 votes Thursday. But the debate over Olson--which had already been delayed four times in recent weeks amid partisan wrangling and a Democratic walkout--proved much more divisive.

At issue is Olson’s role in what is known as “the Arkansas Project,” an ominous-sounding $2.4-million effort by the conservative magazine American Spectator in the mid-1990s to research criminal and ethical allegations against Clinton. The undertaking was financed by foundations run by Richard Mellon Scaife, a major backer of conservative causes.

Olson, 60, graduated from Berkeley’s Boalt Hall School of Law and is a Washington-based partner at the blue-chip Los Angeles law firm of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher.

He had argued numerous cases before the U.S. Supreme Court even before Bush vs. Gore, December’s historic showdown over the election results in Florida. He has taken a conservative stance on a range of legal issues, including an unsuccessful effort to keep women out of an all-male military school and a successful battle against a voting policy in Hawaii that favored native Hawaiians.

Testifying before the Judiciary Committee last month, Olson acknowledged that he served on the board of American Spectator and, under an alias, co-wrote articles that ripped into the ethics and politics of the Clintons and former Atty. Gen. Janet Reno. Olson said he probably should have been more restrained in some of his political attacks.

But he denied that he had any involvement in the “origin or management” of the Arkansas Project.

Democrats, pointing to allegations from a former American Spectator writer who said Olson was directly involved in anti-Clinton story discussions, accused him of being evasive or dishonest in his answers.

“There are just so many discrepancies” in Olson’s testimony, Leahy insisted. “Is it selective memory, or is there something he didn’t want us to know?”

But Republicans defended Olson, accusing the Democrats of using baseless accusations to launch a “smear campaign” against the nominee because of his conservative politics.

“We have seen too much personal destruction, and I plead with my colleagues not to allow another incredibly accomplished person to be turned into a one-dimensional caricature,” said Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah), chairman of the Judiciary Committee.

The pleas left Democrats unmoved. It was the first tie vote on a nominee before the Judiciary Committee in memory, aides said.

Olson declined to comment on the vote afterward. But Hatch said he thought the Democrats’ tactics portend a “constant battle” in the Senate--not only over the solicitor general’s post but over a slew of Bush’s recent nominations for the federal bench as well.

The split committee vote poses the first procedural test of a power-sharing deal reached in January by Republicans and Democrats to run the 50-50 Senate.

Although Republicans complain that Bush’s picks for key Justice posts are getting delayed, Democrats respond that the GOP stalled frequently on Clinton administration nominations.

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Times staff writer Janet Hook contributed to this story.