Michael Chertoff

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Michael Chertoff

Michael Chertoff (November 28, 1953), is the current United States Secretary of Homeland Security.

He previously served as a United States Court of Appeals judge and former federal prosecutor, and assistant U.S. Attorney General. He was nominated as Homeland Security Secretary by President George W. Bush on January 11, 2005 to succeed Tom Ridge as Secretary of the United States Department of Homeland Security. He was confirmed in this position by the U.S. Senate on February 15, 2005, in a unanimous 98-0 vote, and sworn into office the same day (although a ceremonial swearing-in presided over by Bush took place on March 3).

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Early history

His grandfather was a Jew from Russia, so his name has Russian origin. Young Chertoff was born an Israeli citizen (by virtue of his mother's Israeli citizenship) in Elizabeth, New Jersey, the son of a rabbi and El Al's first flight attendant (Livia Chertoff), Michael Chertoff went to The Pingry School in high school. He later attended Harvard University, graduating in 1975. He then graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School in 1978, going on to clerk for appellate judge Murray Gurfein for a year before clerking for United States Supreme Court justice William Brennan from 1979 to 1980. He worked in private practice with Latham & Watkins from 1980 to 1983 before being hired as a prosecutor by Rudolph Giuliani, then the U.S. attorney for Manhattan, working on mafia and political corruption-related cases.

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Public service

In 1987, Chertoff joined the office of the U.S. Attorney for the state of New Jersey. He was appointed by President George H.W. Bush in 1990 as United States Attorney for the state in 1990. Chertoff was asked to stay in his position when the Clinton administration took office in 1993, at the request of Democratic Senator Bill Bradley; he was the only U.S. attorney not replaced. Chertoff stayed with the U.S. Attorney's office until 1994, when he entered private practice, returning to Latham & Watkins as a partner.

Despite his friendly relationship with some Democrats, during the Whitewater scandal investigation of Bill and Hillary Clinton, Chertoff was special counsel for the Senate committee studying allegations against the Clintons. When Chertoff faced Senate confirmation in 2003 for a federal judgeship, Hillary Rodham Clinton, then a Senator from New York, cast the lone dissenting vote against Chertoff's confirmation. She explained that her vote was in protest of the way junior White House staffers were "very badly treated" by Chertoff's staff during the Whitewater investigation.

Chertoff is the co-author, along with Viet Dinh, of the USA PATRIOT Act, signed into law October 26, 2001.

In 2000, Chertoff worked as special counsel to the New Jersey State Senate Judiciary Committee, investigating racial profiling in New Jersey. He also did some fundraising for George W. Bush and other Republicans during the 2000 election cycle and advised Bush's presidential campaign on criminal justice issues. From 2001 to 2003, he headed the criminal division of the Department of Justice, leading the prosecution's case against terrorist suspect Zacarias Moussaoui and against accounting firm Arthur Andersen for destroying documents relating to the Enron collapse. His prosecution of Arthur Andersen was controversial resulting in the collapse of the firm and the loss of employment by its 26,000 employees. The Supreme Court overturned the conviction and the case has not been retried. At the DOJ he also came under fire as one of the chief architects of the Bush Administration's legal strategies in the War on Terror, particularly regarding the detainment of thousands of Middle Eastern immigrants. Chertoff was appointed to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia by Bush on March 5, 2003, and was confirmed by the Senate 88-1 on June 9.

Michael Chertoff is sworn-in by George W. Bush

In late 2004, after the controversial Bernard Kerik was forced to decline President Bush's offer to replace the outgoing Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge, a lengthy search ensued to find a suitable replacement. Citing his experience with post-9/11 terror legislation, Bush nominated Chertoff to the post in January 2005. He was unanimously approved for the position of Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security by the Senate on February 15, 2005.

Most recently Chertoff has managed the FEMA response to Hurricane Katrina. On the third of September, several days after the initial strike of the hurricane many (including the New Orleans mayor, Ray Nagin) indicated severe dissatisfaction with the response from Washington, citing the delay between the general knowledge of the storm's likely impact and any effective federal response. Lousiana's Governor Blanco declared a state of emergency on August 26 [1]; a week later, New Orleans remained in a state of chaos.

Chertoff himself appeared misinformed about the situation, presumably because of the LA governor, even calling the situation at the Convention Center "rumors" after it had been in the news most of the day. While defending the federal government's response in a September 3, 2005 press conference, Chertoff asserted that no one had ever predicted a disaster of this magnitude; however, warnings had in fact come for years from experts in the private sector as well as government agencies at all levels, including FEMA itself, who had identified a disaster such as this as one of the three most likely catastrophes to strike the US. CNN: [2] Houston Chronicle: [3].

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