The Fall of Greg Craig, Obama's Top Lawyer

How Obama's lawyer sparked a battle royal when he tried to keep some of the President's campaign promises in the war on terrorism

Doug Mills / The New York Times / Redux

Obama turned to Craig to roll back Bush-era policies in the war on terrorism. But by September, Craig had been sidelined by pragmatists.

Nearly 100 days after Barack Obama entered office, his top White House lawyer, Greg Craig, braced the President's senior advisers for a potentially explosive development. The Administration was preparing to release photographs of suspected terrorists being abused in U.S. custody. On April 16, Craig asked chief of staff Rahm Emanuel to focus on the issue. Emanuel pleaded for more time to bury the release behind other news.

The White House made public its plans to release the photos seven...

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