Matthew Boyle uncovers an Orwellian scandal:
Internal Department of Justice emails obtained by The Daily Caller show Attorney General Eric Holder’s communications staff has collaborated with the left-wing advocacy group Media Matters for America in an attempt to quell news stories about scandals plaguing Holder and America’s top law enforcement agency.
Dozens of pages of emails between DOJ Office of Public Affairs Director Tracy Schmaler and Media Matters staffers show Schmaler, Holder’s top press defender, working with Media Matters to attack reporters covering DOJ scandals. TheDC obtained the emails through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. . . .
Emails sent in September and November 2010 show Schmaler working with Media Matters staffer Jeremy Holden on attacking news coverage of the New Black Panther Party voter intimidation scandal.
Holden attacked former DOJ Civil Rights Division attorneys J. Christian Adams and Hans von Spakovsky on Sept. 20, 2010 for what he called an attempt “to reignite the phony New Black Panther Party scandal.”
Before Holden posted his article at 7:52 p.m., Schmaler sent him several emails with information helping him attack both former DOJ officials. . . .
Read the whole scary thing. You may ask, “Who is Tracy Schmaler?” Former communications director for the Senate Judiciary Committee under Democrat Sen. Patrick Leahy.
UPDATE: Some more helpful background on Schmaler from last November, courtesy of J. Christian Adams at PJ Media:
Holder is spending five days in the Dominican Republic, Barbados, and Trinidad. I have learned from sources with direct knowledge of Tracy Schmaler’s goings-on that the spin-mistress of the Justice Department Office of Public Affairs is accompanying Holder on this tropical jaunt. . . .
Tracy Schmaler is a name which may grow into a household one as the lies surrounding Fast and Furious unravel faster. . . .
She is the witchy federal employee who screams and cusses at reporters for NBC, the Washington Times, CBS and the American Spectator, yet doesn’t get fired because thug is so in style in this administration.
Read the rest of that story. A press release about Schmalter’s promotion at DOJ mentioned that she was once . . . a reporter?
Neutral objectivity!
UPDATE II: J. Christian Adams has some interesting information on Media Matters “flying monkey” Matt Gertz, an obedient henchman of the DOJ’s chief propagandist Schmaler:
Gertz also provided quick reports to Schmaler about his attacks on PJ Media’s Andy McCarthy, Town Hall’s Katie Pavlich, Breitbart’s Joel Pollack, and Megyn Kelly of Fox News.
This exposes MMFA as the brownshirt operation it really is.
UPDATE III: Informed by J. Christian Adams on Twitter that Schmaler’s gig as a reporter was at the Rutland (Vt.) Herald before joining Senator Leahy’s staff. Another trip through the media-Democrat revolving door for a left-wing reporter. Republicans, by contrast, would never let an actual journalist within a half-mile of their media-relations office, because all GOP campaign staffers think of themselves as media experts, which explains their vicious hostility toward the press. Keep it up, guys — one of these days, that strategy might start working.
UPDATE IV: Linked by Walla Walla Tea Party Patriots, Darth Chipmunk and the Lonely Conservative — thanks!
