Although many Republicans would rather not see Jack Abramoff's name in print ever again, with the arrest of a high ranking Bush administration who had previously worked for Abramoff, it seems that these hopes might not come to fruition. And in tomorrow's paper, The New York Times' Philip Shenon reports on even more startling news from the Abramoff file.

The Justice Department's inspector general and the F.B.I. are looking into the demotion of a veteran federal prosecutor whose reassignment nearly three years ago shut down a criminal investigation of the Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff, current and former department officials report.

They said investigators had questioned whether the demotion of the prosecutor, Frederick A. Black, in November 2002 was related to his alert to Justice Department officials days earlier that he was investigating Mr. Abramoff. The lobbyist is a major Republican party fund-raiser and a close friend of several Congressional leaders.

[...]

Colleagues said they recalled that Mr. Black was distressed when he was notified by the department in November 2002 that he was being replaced.

The announcement came only days after Mr. Black had notified the department's public integrity division in Washington, by telephone and e-mail communication, that he had opened a criminal investigation into Mr. Abramoff's lobbying activities for the Guam judges, the colleague said. The judges had sought Mr. Abramoff's help in blocking a bill in Congress to restructure the island's courts.

The colleagues said that Mr. Black was also surprised when his newly arrived bosses in Guam blocked him from involvement in public corruption cases in 2003. Justice Department officials said Mr. Black was asked instead to focus on terrorism investigations, which had taken on new emphasis after the Sept. 11 attacks.

"Whatever the motivation in replacing Fred, his demotion meant that the investigation of Abramoff died," said a former colleague in Guam.

It's highly possible that this is merely a coincidence, that Black happened to be reassigned to focus on terrorism around the same time that he commenced the Abramoff probe. His barring from investigating public corruption could, too, have been a result of this.

But Shenon's article raises some real questions about Jack Abramoff's relationship with the Bush administration, especially in the wake of David Safavian's arrest. Hopefully the inspector general and/or the F.B.I. will be able to get to the bottom of this, and either exonerate the administration or place some blame where it is deserved.