WASHINGTON (By Laurie Kellman, Associated Press) March 6, 2007 — The probe into the Bush administration's firings of U.S. attorneys intensified Monday as lawmakers ordered two more ousted officials to tell their stories and the Justice Department said Republican Sen. Pete Domenici had complained repeatedly to the attorney general about one of the prosecutors.

The administration has said eight prosecutors were told to leave, all but one for performance-related reasons. However, Democrats have suggested ever more pointedly that politics was behind many of the dismissals, and the Domenici revelation fueled that idea.

Six of those fired, meanwhile, issued a stiff defense of their conduct and implied that they had had differences with Justice Department officials in Washington.

"We leave with no regrets, because we served well and upheld the best traditions of the Department of Justice," the group said in a joint statement released in advance of a Tuesday hearing by a House subcommittee.

The Justice Department, besieged by charges of cronyism, acknowledged that lawmakers — both Republican and Democratic — had complained about several of the eight.

One, David Iglesias of New Mexico, was the subject of four phone calls from Domenici, R-N.M., to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and his deputy questioning whether the prosecutor was "up to the job," department spokesman Brian Roehrkasse said.

It's unclear whether Iglesias was aware of the senator's calls to the Justice Department, but he knew of Domenici's interest in his work. Domenici said over the weekend that he had called the prosecutor in October 2006 to ask about the progress of a probe into an alleged Democratic kickback scheme.

Iglesias has said he received calls from two lawmakers — he has not named them publicly — who inquired about the case. He said that he felt pressured by them to rush indictments before the November elections.

Domenici has apologized for the call while denying he put any pressure on Iglesias. The Senate ethics manual advises lawmakers to refrain from speaking to court officers about specific proceedings until after they are resolved.

During a briefing that Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty gave senators last month about the firings, McNulty singled out two U.S. attorneys, Iglesias and Carol Lam of California, who had generated "extensive congressional concern," according to a senior administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to speak on the record about that briefing.

The Justice Department released letters from Sen. Dianne Feinstein and Rep. Darrell Issa of California to Gonzales and Lam complaining about Lam's prosecution record with illegal immigrants, and other matters.

Lam's and Iglesias' accounts are just two of the stories expected to receive public airings on Capitol Hill Tuesday. The Justice Department has said Iglesias was among those dismissed for performance-related issues.

U.S. attorneys are political appointees and can be fired for any reason, or none at all. But these firings have become a stress point of a power struggle between the Republican Bush administration and newly ascendant Democrats in Congress.

Separately on Monday, the Justice Department said that Michael Battle — a senior official who directed the department's Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys and had personally informed the ousted prosecutors of their removal — would leave his post March 16.

Battle, who has held his job since June 2005, had informed the department last summer that he wished to pursue opportunities outside government, the department said. Battle was not involved in the decision-making that led to the prosecutors' ouster, the department said.

"His departure is not connected to the U.S. attorney controversy whatsoever," Justice's Roehrkasse said.

Democrats scoffed.

"The wheels seem to be coming off the Bush administration's increasingly hollow defense of its decision to fire eight U.S. Attorneys," said Rep. Linda Sanchez, D-Calif., who will chair the House hearings Tuesday.

Her panel subpoenaed two more fired prosecutors, Daniel Bogden of Nevada and Paul Charlton of Arizona — to testify.

They are the fifth and sixth ordered to testify. The others — Iglesias, Lam, H.E. "Bud" Cummins of Arkansas and John McKay of Washington — are expected to testify before both the House panel and the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The six attorneys said in a statement released ahead of the proceedings that they were given "little or no information about the reason" for their firings.

"When we had new ideas or differing opinions, we assumed that such thoughts would always be welcomed by the department and could be freely and openly debated within the halls of that great institution," they said.

Domenici, meanwhile, faced ethics questions from a watchdog group but it was unclear whether he would face a Senate probe. Ethics Committee Chairwoman Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and Vice Chair John Cornyn, R-Texas, refused in a statement to say whether the panel had received a complaint.

Domenici said Sunday he had had a brief conversation with Iglesias last year and asked "if he could tell me what was going on in that investigation and give me an idea of what time frame we were looking at."

"In retrospect, I regret making that call and I apologize," Domenici said. "However, at no time in that conversation or any other conversation with Mr. Iglesias did I ever tell him what course of action I thought he should take on any legal matter. I have never pressured him nor threatened him in any way."

"If, as it appears, Senator Domenici pressured a sitting U.S. attorney to push a criminal case to benefit a political party, the ethics committee should take swift and harsh action," said Melanie Sloan, executive director of the private group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics.