Did what she knew was right, say colleagues
civil rights division in the Obama Administration. “Acting Attorney General Yates’s record is simply beyond reproach,” said Perez, who is running to be chair of the Democratic National Committee.
But Trump’s senior policy adviser, Stephen Miller, blasted Yates on Fox News after the acting Attorney General was fired.
“It can’t be stated strongly enough how reckless, irresponsible and improper the behaviour was of the acting Attorney General, Sally Yates, in refusing to defend the President’s order,” said Miller, who accused Yates of “refusing to defend the lawful power of the President”. He added that he had no doubt about the legality of the order.
For the past two years, Yates has been responsible for the day-to-day running of the 113,000-employee Justice Department. She was also been responsible for overseeing the Justice
She advocated very strongly as a one-woman show for law enforcement and made the Obama Administration pause on policies she thought would be harmful. Emily Pierce on Sally Yates
Department’s work on the prior White House’s clemency initiative, in which the President granted commutations to thousands of nonviolent drug offenders who met certain criteria set out by the Administration.
She also wrote a new policy two years ago that became known as “the Yates memo”, which made the prosecution of individual executives — not just the corporations that employ them — a top priority for federal prosecutors.
Last month, Yates was one of the Justice officials who announced that federal prosecutors indicted six executives at Volkswagen in connection with the company’s diesel emissions scandal; the company agreed to pay US$4.3 billion ($5.9b) in criminal and civil penalties.
Former Justice Department spokeswoman Emily Pierce said that Yates was known in the department for voicing her opinions when she thought the Administration was going in the wrong direction. Pierce said Yates was particularly vocal during a debate over government access to encrypted communications during criminal investigations, when some officials wanted to make it harder for law enforcement to access the locked information.
“She advocated very strongly as a one-woman show for law enforcement and made the Obama Administration pause on policies she thought would be harmful,” Pierce said.