David Addington

Many observers credit Cheney's staff as playing a key role in boosting the influence of the OVP. And few staff members play a more instrumental role in shaping the OVP's policies than David Addington. Sometimes referred to as "Cheney's Cheney" or "Cheney's hit man," Addington has been a loyal Cheney sidekick since the mid-1980s, when he served as counsel for the House Committee on Intelligence and the Committee on Foreign Affairs. When Cheney moved from Congress to the Pentagon after the election of George H.W. Bush, Addington tagged along, serving as special assistant and later general counsel to then-Defense Secretary Cheney. And when Cheney became vice president to George W. Bush, Addington became the VP's general counsel, a position he held until November 2005, when he took over as chief of staff. (For a detailed account of Addington's career, see Jane Mayer, "The Hidden Power," New Yorker, July 3, 2006.)

Commenting on his promotion to chief of staff, the New Republic's Ryan Lizza wrote: "In fact, Libby's resignation may be a bigger boon to Democrats than they realize. Addington is both more extreme and more politically tone-deaf than his predecessor. He and Cheney are the harbingers of bad times for Bush. When their names are in the news, political peril seems to follow" (New Republic, November 7, 2005).

What Lizza failed to point out, however, was the remarkably thin public record that Addington, a government lawyer for over two decades, has left behind. Commenting on his penchant for secrecy, the New Yorker's Jane Mayer wrote: "He is extremely private; he keeps the door of his office locked at all times, colleagues say, because of the national security documents in his files. He has left almost no public paper trail, and he does not speak to the press or allow photographs to be taken for news stories. (He declined repeated requests to be interviewed for this article.)" (New Yorker, July 3, 2006).

However, since joining the George W. Bush administration, Addington's name has surfaced from time to time-sometimes with embarrassing results. In 2002, for example, John Wooden, owner of a parody-producing company called Chickenhead Productions, unveiled Whitehouse.org, a parody website replete with photos and a fake bio of Lynne Cheney. Soon after the posting of the bio-which claimed that the second lady "likes movies, Infusium 23 Shampoo, postmodernist interpretative dance"-Addington, then the VP's general counsel, fired off a letter to Wooden demanding that he "delete the photographs of [Lynne Cheney] and the fictitious biographical statement about her from the website."

The only success Addington's letter had was to push droves of curious web surfers to the Whitehouse.org website to see Mrs. Cheney lampooned. It also led reporters to query Cheney's office about the VP's role in the affair; the OVP denied he had any knowledge about the letter.

Some three years later, on October 31, 2005, when the White House (the real one) announced that Addington was going to replace Libby as Cheney's chief of staff, Wooden was quick to react, posting on his company's website a message to Addington: "Chickenhead would like to formally congratulate its best-ever pal, David Addington, on his recent promotion."

According to the New Republic's Lizza, the "Chickenhead incident," although only a "minor dustup," is "emblematic of the larger role Cheney's staff-and specifically Addington-play in the Bush White House. On issue after issue, the Office of the Vice President overreacts and overreaches, pushing policies that end up embarrassing the administration and from which, more often than not, President Bush must retreat. But Cheney never seems to learn any lessons from these capers. If he had, he never would have promoted David Addington."

Shortly before his promotion, Addington was one of several Cheney aides cited in connection with the ongoing investigation by Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald into the so-called PlameGate affair. Although not charged, Addington was mentioned-by title only-in the indictment as part of a group of officials in Cheney's office who endeavored in early 2003 to identify Valerie Plame, gather information about her husband Joseph Wilson's trip to Niger, and then spread this information (Philadelphia Inquirer, October 30, 2005).

The special prosecutor's investigation is only one of a series of controversies that have plagued Addington during his time in the VP's office. He has been accused of playing a central role in the decision to block the release of key documents to the Senate Intelligence Committee regarding its investigation into pre-war intelligence (National Journal, October 27, 2005). In 2002, he helped draft the White House "torture memos," which claimed that the president could sidestep the Geneva Conventions in the "war on terror" (New York Times, November 3, 2005 ). In 2001, when the General Accounting Office was trying to investigate the role of executives and lobbyists in helping Cheney put together his energy plan, Addington consistently attacked in letters to the GAO the agency's authority to investigate the matter (New Republic Online, November 7, 2005). And Addington led efforts to block Congress's attempt to draft stringent rules governing the treatment of detainees in places like Abu Ghraib (New York Times, November 3, 2005).

More recently, Addington was blamed for pushing the OVP to resist efforts by Bush administration lawyers to reverse the White House position on whether to allow court oversight of the National Security Agency's warrantless surveillance program. When the administration announced in early January 2007 that it would allow oversight of the program, Addington was viewed as having "clearly lost this round," as one unnamed official told the Post's David Ignatius.

The surveillance program, which was secretly instituted by the administration in 2002, sidestepped a law passed by Congress in 1978 in response to the Watergate scandal. The law, which requires that efforts by the government to eavesdrop on U.S. citizens be vetted by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, is meant to protect civil liberties and prevent abuses of executive power. When former Secretary of State Colin Powell first heard about the administration's surveillance program, which was revealed by the New York Times in late 2005, he reportedly said: "It's Addington. He doesn't care about the Constitution" (New Yorker, July 3, 2006).

According to the New Yorker's Mayer, Addington is the architect of what is known as the "New Paradigm," which she described as a "legal strategy for the war on terror" that rests "on a reading of the Constitution that few legal scholars share-namely, that the president, as commander-in-chief, has the authority to disregard virtually all previously known legal boundaries, if national security demands it. Under this framework, statutes prohibiting torture, secret detention, and warrantless surveillance have been set aside." Describing Addington's role in developing the paradigm, Mayer quoted a former administration lawyer who "said that the administration's legal positions were, to a remarkable degree, 'all Addington.' Another lawyer, Richard L. Shiffrin, who until 2003 was the Pentagon's deputy general counsel for intelligence, said that Addington was 'an unopposable force.'"

The net effect of Addington's-and other administration lawyers'-influence on the president's own views, says Bruce Fein, a generally pro-Bush Republican activist, is "quite alarming." Fein told Mayer that Addington and his cohorts have "staked out powers that are a universe beyond any other administration. This president has made claims that are really quite alarming. He's said that there are no restraints on his ability, as he sees it, to collect intelligence, to open mail, to commit torture, and to use electronic surveillance. If you used the president's reasoning, you could shut down Congress for leaking too much. His war powers allow him to declare anyone an illegal combatant. All the world's a battlefield-according to this view, he could kill someone in Lafayette Park if he wants! It's got the sense of Louis XIV: 'I am the State.'"

Private Sector

Education

White House, Personnel Announcement, Office of the Vice President, October 31, 2005, http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/10/20051031-2.html.

Ryan Lizza, "Chief of Gaffe," New Republic Online, November 7, 2005.

Jane Mayer, "The Hidden Power," New Yorker, July 3, 2006.

Ron Hutcheson, "Indictment Leaves Much Still Unsaid," Philadelphia Inquirer, October 30, 2005.

"Cheney, Libby Blocked Papers to Senate Intelligence Panel," National Journal, October 27, 2005.

Editorial, "The Prison Puzzle," New York Times, November 3, 200 5.

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