Baucus Didn’t Disclose Relatoinship to DOJ Officials While Recommending Gifrlfriend

Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) did not disclose to the Justice Department anything about his personal relationship with a woman he recommended to be a United States Attorney, according to a Department official involved in the selection of federal prosecutors.

Baucus has acknowledged that he recommended his girlfriend, Melodee Hanes, to be the U.S. attorney for Montana, but it has not been previously known whether he or his staff told Justice Department officials about the relationship at the time of his recommendation. An official involved in the vetting of U.S. attorneys says that Baucus did not—a disclosure that is almost certainly going to  escalate questions about Baucus’ conduct.

Baucus, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, submitted Hanes’ name and that of two other Montana attorneys to be U.S. attorney for his state. Senators traditionally nominate three people to the White House, which then considers one or all of them for final appointment.

That Baucus first recommended Hanes for the job was first reported by the website, MainJustice.com.

Hanes herself recommended that her name be withdrawn from consideration, mitigating allegations of favoritism by Baucus. But it is believed that Baucus and Hanes were already involved in a personal relationship when Baucus recommended her.

Hanes also was a well qualified prosecutor at the time Baucus recommended her, also lessening the charge of favoritism in recommending her.

And Baucus has said that he and Hanes were separated from their respective spouses at the time the relationship between the two of them began. Now divorced, Baucus and Hanes now live together on Capitol Hill.

Despite this, however, Justice Department officials say they were blindsided when they learned of the relationship between the Senator and the woman he recommended to be U.S. attorney. Officials also say that the Senator’s non-disclosure might have tainted the selection process.

The Obama Justice Department, citing the politicization of the Department during the Bush administration—most notably the firings of nine U.S. attorneys by Bush for political reasons—has vowed to bring integrity back to the selection and hiring of U.S. Attorneys and other political appointees. They have appointed more career prosecutors to be U.S. attorneys than previous administrations.   And Obama reappointed one U.S. attorney fired by the Bush administration, Dan Bogden, back to his old position as U.S. attorney for Nevada.

The possibility that they might have appointed a U.S. attorney that was a Senator’s girlfriend—could have turned out to have been not only a major political embarrassment but also a potential scandal.

But Department officials are not likely to criticize Baucus publicly. And Hanes has since gotten a job with the Justice Department working on juvenile justice issues. A Justice Department spokesman told the New York Times that she obtained the job independent and because she was highly qualified. Tracy Schmaler, the Justice Department spokeswoman, told the Times that Ms. Hanes was hired “because of her decades of experience in the field,” saying she had specialized in the prosecution of child abuse and neglect at the Polk County Attorney’s Office in Des Moines.

“She has won awards for her work, been published on the topics of child abuse and fatality, and taught classes in these areas to both law students and Department of Human Services child protection investigators,” Shmaler said.