Washington: September 18, 2007 - Mr. Bush had announced the selection of Michael B. Mukasey, a retired federal judge from New York who has presided over several high-profile terrorism trials, during a morning Rose Garden ceremony.  But two Senate Democrats protested.

They warned on Monday that the Judiciary Committee would delay confirmation of President Bush’s choice for attorney general unless the White House turned over documents that the panel was seeking for several investigations.

Mr. Bush had announced the selection of Michael B. Mukasey, a retired federal judge from New York during a morning Rose Garden ceremony. He urged the Senate to confirm Mr. Mukasey promptly as the nation’s 81st attorney general, succeeding Alberto R. Gonzales, who resigned last month under withering attacks from Democrats on Capitol Hill.

“Judge Mukasey is clear-eyed about the threat our nation faces,” Mr. Bush said, with the 66-year-old former jurist by his side. “As a judge and a private lawyer, he’s written on matters of constitutional law and national security. He knows what it takes to fight this war effectively.”

If confirmed, Mr. Mukasey would take over a department that has been burdened by the weight of Congressional inquiries into the dismissals of federal prosecutors and the administration’s domestic wiretapping program. Democrats have expressed deep concerns about that program, and one of the first tasks of any new attorney general would be to go to Capitol Hill to negotiate legislation reauthorizing it.

The selection of Mr. Mukasey — a Washington outsider who met Mr. Bush for the first time during an hour-long interview at the White House on Sept. 1 — seemed to signal that the administration is looking to move past the partisanship that characterized Mr. Gonzales’s tenure.

But two Democrats who will have a powerful say over whether Mr. Mukasey gets confirmed — Senators Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont and Charles E. Schumer of New York — vowed on Monday to use the nomination to extract information from a reluctant White House.

“All I want is the material we need to ask some questions about the former attorney general’s conduct, on torture and warrantless wiretapping, so we can legitimately ask, ‘Here’s what was done in the past, what will you do?”’ Mr. Leahy, the Judiciary Committee chairman, said.

Full Story:http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/18/washington/18attorney.html?th&emc=th