The former actor and governor of California selected Bush as his vice-presidential running mate, and the two defeated incumbent Jimmy Carter and Vice President Walter Mondale in the general election.Īfter two terms as vice president under Reagan, Bush became the Republican presidential nominee in 1988. In 1980, Bush ran for the Republican presidential nomination but lost to Ronald Reagan. After Democrat Jimmy Carter was elected president, Bush resigned from the CIA in January 1977. Liaison Office in the People’s Republic of China, where he served until becoming director of the CIA in January 1976.
In the fall of 1974, Nixon’s successor, President Gerald Ford appointed Bush as the head of the U.S. But other Bush-era policies are still coming under legal scrutiny.1978 "Gang of 19" activists occupy Denver intersection to protest inaccessibility on the city’s bus system When it came to Libby, Bush felt he had done enough.īut the fight over the pardon was also a prelude to the difficult questions about justice and national security inherited by the Obama Administration: How closely should the nation examine the actions of government officials who took steps–legal or possibly illegal–to defend the nation’s security during the war on terrorism? The Libby investigation, which began nearly six years ago, went to the heart of whether the Bush Administration misled the public in making its case to invade Iraq. As a Cheney confidant puts it, the Vice President believed he and the President could claim the war on terrorism as his greatest legacy only if they defended at all costs the men and women who fought in the trenches. And in a broader way, it uncovers a fundamental difference in how the two men regarded the legacy of the Bush years. It reveals a gap in the two men’s views of crime and punishment. It reveals how one question–whether to grant a presidential pardon to a top vice-presidential aide–strained the bonds between Bush and his deputy and closest counselor. These last hours represent a climactic chapter in the mysterious and mostly opaque relationship at the center of a tumultuous period in American history. 19, 2009, Bush would give Cheney his final decision.
#GEORGE BUSH VICE PRESIDENT FULL#
And so, on his last full day in office, Jan.
A top adviser to Bush says he had never seen the Vice President focused so single-mindedly on anything over two terms. INSETS, FROM LEFT: CBS/LANDOV TOM GRILL/GETTY.īush had already decided the week before that Libby was undeserving and told Cheney so, only to see the question raised again. “We don’t want to leave anyone on the battlefield,” Cheney argued.Ĭover Credit: PHOTOGRAPH BY LUKE FRAZZA/AFP/GETTY. The Libby pardon, aides reported, had become something of a crusade for Cheney, who seemed prepared to push his nine-year-old relationship with Bush to the breaking point–and perhaps past it–over the fate of his former aide. Libby had been convicted nearly two years earlier of obstructing an investigation into the leak of a covert CIA officer’s identity by senior White House officials. For over a month Cheney had been pleading, cajoling, even pestering Bush to pardon the Vice President’s former chief of staff, I. Cheney had one final and painful piece of business to conclude. Hours before they were to leave office after eight troubled years, George W. Lewis (Scooter) Libby, saying “for years I have heard that he has been treated unfairly.”
3, 2009 TIME cover story “The Final Days of Bush and Cheney.” On Friday, President Donald Trump granted a full pardon for I. Editor’s note: The following is an excerpt from the Aug.