Van Jones, President Obama's green jobs adviser, had been linked to efforts suggesting a government role in the Sept. 11 terror attacks.
FOXNews.com
Sunday, September 06, 2009
June 16: Van Jones is seen at the National Summit in Detroit.
White House green jobs adviser Van Jones resigned in the middle of the Labor Day weekend following persistent controversy over his past remarks and associations.
Jones, who served as an adviser to the White House Council on Environmental Quality, had generated mounting criticism over the past week. He earlier issued back-to-back apologies -- first, for calling Republicans "assholes" during a videotaped address earlier in the year, and second for signing a petition in 2004 supporting the "9/11 truther" movement, which believes the Bush administration may have been involved in the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
The latter development, which came on top of several others, was perhaps the most devastating and led to calls for his resignation.
Jones stepped down late Saturday.
In a sharply worded statement, Jones said the controversy had become an unceasing distraction and assailed his critics.
"On the eve of historic fights for health care and clean energy, opponents of reform have mounted a vicious smear campaign against me. They are using lies and distortions to distract and divide," Jones said.
He said he had been "inundated" with calls from supporters urging him to "stay and fight."
"But I came here to fight for others, not for myself," he said. "I cannot in good conscience ask my colleagues to expend precious time and energy defending or explaining my past. We need all hands on deck, fighting for the future."
Nancy Sutley, chairwoman of the council Jones had been advising, said in a statement that she accepted the resignation, which was effective immediately, and called him a "strong voice for creating 21st century jobs that improve energy efficiency and utilize renewable resources."
The White House had stayed relatively quiet about Jones as the controversy developed, leading to speculation that he was on the way out.
Asked about Jones Friday, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said only that he "continues to work in the administration."
Jones is considered a rising star in environmental circles. He wrote the New York Times bestseller "The Green Collar Economy" and has co-founded and worked with several groups dedicated to helping low-income and minority communities -- often through green jobs and better environmental policy. He got his start as a San Francisco-area activist.
But critics raised questions about his fitness for a White House-level office, pointing to his radical activities a decade ago as well as more recent controversial stances.
Jones was an self-described "communist" during the '90s and used to work with a group dedicated to Marxist and Leninist philosophies. His comments, even in recent years, were often racially charged. He's blamed "white polluters and white environmentalists" for "steering poison" to minority communities. In 2005, he drew a distinction between white and black youths involved in shooting incidents by referencing the 1999 Columbine High School massacre.
"You've never seen a Columbine done by a black child. Never," Jones said. "They always say, 'We can't believe it happened here. We can't believe it's these suburban white kids.' It's only them!" he said. "Now, a black kid might shoot another black kid. He's not going to shoot up the whole school."
But such statements did not draw widespread attention until after a February video surfaced showing him calling Republicans "assholes" during an address in Berkeley, Calif. Jones apologized, but faced down his past again when it was discovered that he signed a 2004 statement calling on then-New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer and others to launch an investigation into evidence that suggests "people within the current administration may indeed have deliberately allowed 9/11 to happen, perhaps as a pretext for war."
Jones afterward issued a blanket apology for his past statements and said the petition does not reflect his views. An aide said Jones didn't carefully review the petition at the time.
But that claim was swiftly disputed by 911Truth.org. "He did agree with that statement and he did sign on to it," 911Truth.org spokesman Mike Berger told FOX News in a telephone interview from St. Louis on Friday. Berger said the group's "original board members individually confirmed all signatories that had signed on to the statement."
The calls for resignation mounted.
Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind., became the first lawmaker to call on Jones to resign, issuing a press release calling for a moratorium on the hiring of additional "czars" until the vetting process in Jones's case could be properly investigated.
Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., demanded that the Senate Green Jobs and New Economy Subcommittee conduct hearings to probe Jones's behavior and "reassure the American people that their government is safe from his divisive, incendiary and ultimately counterproductive sentiments."
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