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| Attorney General Eric Holder to step down | Attorney General Eric Holder to step down |
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| Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., an original member of President Obama’s Cabinet and a vocal proponent of civil rights and criminal justice reform, plans to leave the post as soon as a successor is confirmed. | |
| President Obama will make an announcement about Holder Thursday afternoon, according to White House officials. | |
| “After serving for nearly six years as the head of the Justice Department, Holder is the first African American to be Attorney General of the United States and will be the fourth longest person to hold the position,” a White House official, who asked not to be identified because the announcement had not been made yet, said in an e-mail. | |
| “Holder’s accomplishments have established a historic legacy of civil rights enforcement and restoring fairness to the criminal justice system. Holder revitalized the Department’s praised Civil Rights Division, protected the rights of the LGBT community, successfully prosecuted terrorists, and fought tirelessly for voting rights, to name a few. He will remain at the Department of Justice until his post is filled.” | “Holder’s accomplishments have established a historic legacy of civil rights enforcement and restoring fairness to the criminal justice system. Holder revitalized the Department’s praised Civil Rights Division, protected the rights of the LGBT community, successfully prosecuted terrorists, and fought tirelessly for voting rights, to name a few. He will remain at the Department of Justice until his post is filled.” |
| When Holder — a personal friend of the president’s, who has clashed with congressional Republicans on issues ranging from voting rights to the department’s “Fast and Furious” anti-weapons smuggling program — would leave office has been one of Washington’s great guessing games. | |
| Holder discussed his plans personally with Obama on several occasions in recent months, according to a Justice Department official, and finalized those plans in an hour-long conversation with the president at the White House residence over Labor Day weekend. | |
| At a formal announcement later Thursday, the official added, Holder will thank the president for giving him the chance to lead the Justice Department, which he will call the “greatest honor of my professional life.” | |
| NPR first reported the news of Holder’s departure late Thursday morning. | NPR first reported the news of Holder’s departure late Thursday morning. |
| Close friends said Holder had been exhausted by his job at times and had earlier considered leaving several times, especially last summer and fall, when he was facing pillorying from Hill Republicans over the department’s handling of the Fast & Furious gun program. But Holder was very reluctant to leave his Justice post at a low point, and he wanted to depart on his own terms. | |
| An earlier low period came when Obama’s then-chief of staff Rahm Emanuel fought Holder on his highly public announcement that he hoped to try terror suspects in federal courts, part of his legal team’s work to help close a U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and deliver on an early campaign promise of Obama. In one infamous incident, Holder and Emanuel reportedly cursed each other out when Emanuel said Holder’s Guantanamo work was going to undercut his White House efforts to reform health care. | |
| Holder now announces his resignation after a series of successes in the past year. Among the most recent is the accolades he has received from community activists for his leadership in investigating and responding to the police shooting of an unarmed teenager in Ferguson, Mo. Holder has often spoken about race relations in blunter terms than the president. | |
| While Holder has no immediate plans once he steps down, the Justice official said, he has spoken with friends and colleagues about trying to to continue his work on restoring trust between law enforcement and minority communities. | |
| While well-respected by many in the legal and activist community, Holder will be exiting his position in relatively low public regard. Nearly four in 10 Americans are unable to rate him, but among those who do, his negative ratings are twice as large as his positive ones, according to a recent NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll. | |
| Carol D. Leonnig and Peyton Craighill contributed to this report. |