Cheney Ex-Aide Worked for Terror-Loving Firm

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Before joining the White House staff, former Dick Cheney aide “Scooter” Libby worked for a law practice that now represents Guantanamo detainees.

Libby — “Dick Cheney’s Dick Cheney” — worked for the Philadelphia, Penn.-based firm Dechert LLP before the vice president hired him to be his chief of staff.

Last week, a senior Pentagon official joined conservative efforts to blackball law firms who provided legal assistance to detainees being held at the military’s Guantanamo Bay prison. Charles Stimson, deputy assistant secretary of defense for detainee affairs, called on corporations to sever ties to such firms in order to pressure them to drop their detainee clients. The Pentagon has disavowed the comments; Stimson has been silent.

Federal prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald helped reunite Libby with his old firm, although it was likely a few years before Scooter had hoped: Libby retained Dechert partner Joseph Tate to help represent him through the Plame leak probe.

Dechert is the second detainee-loving law firm we’ve noted Libby is paying for his defense. The other is New York-based Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP.

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