Alberto Gonzales
Alberto R. Gonzales (born August 4, 1955) was the 80th United States Attorney General, appointed in February 2005 by President George W. Bush, becoming the highest-ranking Hispanic-American in Executive Branch government to date. He was the first Hispanic to serve as White House Counsel, and earlier he had been Bush's General Counsel during his governorship of Texas. Gonzales had also served as Secretary of State of Texas and then as a Texas Supreme Court Justice.
Gonzales's tenure as U.S. Attorney General was marked by controversy regarding warrantless surveillance of U.S. citizens and the legal authorization of so-called "Enhanced interrogation techniques" (i.e., much later, generally-acknowledged as constituting torture), in the U.S. government's post-9/11 "war on terrorism". Following bipartisan calls for his removal, Gonzales resigned from the office "in the best interests of the department," on August 27, 2007, effective September 17, 2007. Democrats were particularly opposed to Gonzales presiding over the firings of several U.S. Attorneys who had refused back-channeled White House directives to prosecute political enemies — allegedly causing the office of Attorney General to become improperly politicized.