Senate Republicans Demand Prosecutor For Sestak Deal

All seven Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee called Wednesday for a special prosecutor to probe whether White House aides broke the law by offering a Senate candidate a job if he quit his race.

At issue was Democratic Representative Joe Sestak's statement in February that the White House offered him a job to drop out of his ultimately successful primary challenge to veteran Senator Arlen Specter.

Republicans have charged that such an offer could have violated federal law, and Democrats have increasingly called on Sestak to clarify exactly what transpired ahead of critical November elections.

Republican senators -- led by the party's top member on the Senate Judiciary Committee, Jeff Sessions -- urged US Attorney General Eric Holder to "appoint a special prosecutor to investigate this matter, which would avoid any appearance of a conflict of interest."

"Such an offer would appear to violate various federal criminal laws," the seven lawmakers wrote.

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In a similar situation, the allegations that the White House offered Joe Sestak a job in exchange for dropping out of the Pennsylvania Senate race echo an earlier report of a job offer to candidate Andrew Romanoff in Colorado.

On September 27, 2009 the Denver Post reported that the Obama administration offered Senate candidate Romanoff a position if he canceled plans to run for the Democratic nomination against incumbent Sen. Michael Bennet.

The paper said the job offer, which specified particular jobs, was reportedly delivered by Jim Messina, Obama’s deputy chief of staff. One position cited by the Post was a job at USAID, the foreign aid agency.

Messina contacted Romanoff soon after news leaked in August 2009 that Romanoff, former Colorado House speaker, would make a primary run against Bennet.

Romanoff turned down the offer and announced his candidacy. Obama then endorsed Bennet, who had been appointed in January 2009 to fill the seat vacated when Ken Salazar became Secretary of the Interior.

But Romanoff trounced Bennet at last weekend's Colorado Democratic assembly, winning the top line on the August primary ballot.The White House denied that Romanoff had been offered a job.

Here's more on that allegation