U.S. Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer (MO-3) has signed onto a resolution (H.Res. 35) of no confidence regarding U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder’s job performance due to his part in the Fast and Furious gun-trafficking scandal and the Justice Department’s probe of journalists’ phone records.

“Lying or misstating under oath before a congressional committee and tracking phone records of news agencies without the appropriate subpoenas are clear violations of Holder’s responsibilities as attorney general and therefore he lacks the confidence of Congress and the American people,” Luetkemeyer said. “The attorney general directs the central agency for enforcement of federal laws and must be held accountable for his actions and held to the same legal standards of all Americans.”

Last June, Luetkemeyer voted to hold Holder in contempt of Congress for his failure to produce critical documents tied to Fast and Furious, a botched sting operation in which the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms sold thousands of weapons to gun traffickers, and then lost track of those weapons, including ones later linked to the killing of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.  The Justice Department has further disregarded legal processes in its latest scandal regarding its overreaching probe into phone records, threatening our nation’s free and open press.

Due to the separation of powers, Congress does not impact directly the removal of officials in the executive branch other than through impeachment proceedings which last happened for a U.S. agency secretary in 1876 when Ulysses S. Grant’s Secretary of War William Belknap was tried for bribery but ultimately resigned on his own. The adoption of a resolution of no confidence concerning an official of the executive branch such as Holder is designed to place pressure on the executive branch to take action against the specific official.