It is hard to tell what state Attorney General Kathleen Kane is waiting for.
The Democrat was charged Aug. 6 with perjury, obstruction and other offenses stemming from the leak of confidential grand jury material and a probe into that leak. The Montgomery County district attorney said in laying out the case that Ms. Kane had “devised a scheme” to leak information from the grand jury “in the hopes of embarrassing and harming former state prosecutors whom she believed — without evidence — had made her look bad.”
That day Gov. Tom Wolf and other Democratic leaders called on her to resign. Republicans, who control both chambers of the Legislature, began to study options for impeachment. And a Quinnipiac University poll last month showed 54 percent disapproved of her job performance, while 49 percent versus 27 percent said she should leave office. For the record, the Post-Gazette urged her to quit back in April.
On Monday the state Supreme Court unanimously ordered the suspension of her law license, a crippling development for any state’s top law enforcement officer. She apparently can still head the office and administer its $93 million budget, but she cannot act as a lawyer and, in seeking re-election next year, would seem to run afoul of the state constitution’s mandate that a candidate for the office be a member of the bar.
Still, Ms. Kane refuses to resign.
An office spokesman said her first deputy, Bruce Beemer, will likely handle the duties that she cannot. That might be fine by Ms. Kane, but it is not acceptable to the people of Pennsylvania, who elected her to the job and no one else. For one thing, how does she justify keeping her $158,764 salary?
Ms. Kane has repeatedly said she has done nothing wrong and will be exonerated once she gets her day in court. “A resignation would be an admission of guilt, and I’m not guilty,” she said last month.
Not exactly. A resignation would mean she wants to spare her office the misery, complication and unflattering light cast by her criminal case — all of which came into full view with the Supreme Court order. This is not just about Kathleen Kane, but the Office of Attorney General.
If she understood that, she’d concentrate on her legal defense and step down. Since she doesn’t, let the impeachment circus begin.
First Published: September 22, 2015, 4:00 a.m.
