By WILL LESTER, Associated Press Writer Will Lester, Associated Press Writer – 1 hr 19 mins ago

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama's adviser Van Jones has resigned amid controversy over past inflammatory statements, the White House said early Sunday.

Jones, an administration official specializing in environmentally friendly "green jobs" with the White House Council on Environmental Quality was linked to efforts suggesting a government role in the 2001 terror attacks and to derogatory comments about Republicans.

The resignation comes as Obama is working to regain his footing in the contentious health care debate.

Jones issued an apology on Thursday for his past statements. When asked the next day whether Obama still had confidence in him, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said only that Jones "continues to work in the administration."

The matter surfaced after news reports of a derogatory comment Jones made in the past about Republicans, and separately, of Jones' name appearing on a petition connected to the events surrounding the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks. That 2004 petition had asked for congressional hearings and other investigations into whether high-level government officials had allowed the attacks to occur.

"On the eve of historic fights for health care and clean energy, opponents of reform have mounted a vicious smear campaign against me," Jones said in his resignation statement. "They are using lies and distortions to distract and divide."

Jones said he has been "inundated with calls from across the political spectrum urging me to stay and fight."

But he said he cannot in good conscience ask his colleagues to spend time and energy defending or explaining his past.

Jones flatly said in an earlier statement that he did not agree with the petition's stand on the 9/11 attacks and that "it certainly does not reflect my views, now or ever."

As for his other comments he made before joining Obama's team, Jones said, "If I have offended anyone with statements I made in the past, I apologize."

Despite his apologies, Republicans demanded Jones quit.

Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana said in a statement, "His extremist views and coarse rhetoric have no place in this administration or the public debate." Missouri Sen. Christopher Bonds said Congress should investigate Jones's fitness the job.

Fox News Channel host Glenn Beck repeatedly denounced Jones after a group the adviser co-founded, ColorofChange.org, led an advertising boycott against Beck's show to protest his claim that Obama is a racist.

James Rucker, the organization's executive director, has said Jones had nothing to do with ColorofChange.org now and didn't even know about the campaign before it started.

Jones, well-known in the environmental movement, was a civil-rights activist in California before shifting his attention to environmental and energy issues. He is known for laying out a broad vision of a green economy.

Nancy Sutley chair of the council, said in a statement released early Sunday that she accepts Jones resignation and thanked him for his service.

"Over the last six months, he had been a strong voice for creating jobs that improve energy efficiency and utilize renewable resources," she said. "We appreciate his hard work and wish him the best moving forward."

Sorry Kim I didn't see this when I posted. Oops

About time. I don't think he should be anywhere in the gov. with the kind of views he has.

You'd think ole'BHO would know how to pick his friends by now.
They need to call Jones like he is.
Good work everyone. Let's keep cleaning house until we get our country back.

Check out this article.

Glenn Beck Gets First Scalp: Van Jones Resigns
Posted: 09- 6-09 01:02 AM | Updated: 09- 6-09 10:25 AM


Beck has his first scalp. Van Jones, under fire from the extremist television show host for his background in radical activism, has resigned from the administration.

Jones was Special Adviser for Green Jobs at the Council on Environmental Quality - the so-called 'Green Jobs' Czar. Jones' 2008 book, The Green Collar Economy, was a New York Times best-seller. Beck is a talk show host for Fox News.

Jones never denied his past affiliation with the radical left. In the '90s, he was involved with the group Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement (STORM), which sympathized with Maoist-inspired peasant movements throughout the world and was organized to protest police brutality.

Jones, however, left radical politics and made the decision to work within the system, rather than try to overthrow it. For Beck, however, Jones' past statements were evidence that Obama is secretly marshaling a cadre of lieutenants pushing an agenda that is "radical, revolutionary and in some cases Marxist." (Meanwhile, in reality, Obama is backing away from even including a public health insurance option as part of health care reform. How that squares with Obama's Marxist agenda Beck has yet to explain.)

Before Beck mentioned Jones in the last few weeks on his Fox News television show, Jones remained an obscure figure in the administration. After Beck mentioned him, protesters at town hall meetings made Jones a staple of their complaints.

Jones, in a statement, said he no longer wanted to be a distraction.

"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. I have been inundated with calls - from across the political spectrum -- urging me to 'stay and fight.' But I came here to fight for others, not for myself. 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."

It's exceedingly unlikely that Beck will be satisfied by Jones' resignation, seeing in it evidence that he was correct in his assessment of Obama's supposed radical lieutenants. "Jones is the tip of the iceberg," Beck has said.

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Once Beck made Jones a target, a series of revelations put him in political danger. Asked in February of this year why Democrats were having trouble pushing through legislation despite overwhelming majorities, he said, "The answer to that is, they're ********." He was presumably referring to the GOP minority but may also have been roping in conservative Democrats.

Jones went on: "And Barack Obama is not an *******. So, now, I will say this: I can be an *******, and some of us who are not Barack Hussein Obama, are going to have to start getting a little bit uppity."

It also emerged that Jones had signed a "truther" petition back in 2004. Truthers insist that there are unanswered questions about what U.S. officials knew about the Sept. 11th terrorist attacks before they occurred and want further investigations. Truthers are the left-wing version of birthers, people who believe that Obama was born in Kenya, is not a citizen and his presidency is illegitimate.

There's nothing inherently left-wing about 9/11 conspiracy theorists or right-wing about birthers; rather, they tend to fall on opposite ideological extremes because of mistrust of the president in question, be he Bush or Obama. But the birther movement includes prominent Republicans, including members of Congress, while connection to the truther movement can help cost a relatively obscure administration official his job.

There's a lesson to be learned. "If you want to say batsh*t-crazy stuff and still be treated as a respectable participant in the national debate, you'd better be a Republican," gauged blogger Mark Kleiman after hearing the news of Jones' resignation. "Suggesting that President Bush invited the 9/11 attacks in order to start a war is really no crazier than suggesting that President Obama wants to let terrorists loose in the United States, or that he plans to kill old people and disabled children, or that there's something sinister about his encouraging schoolkids to study hard."

Those latter three charges, of course, have been leveled recently by elected Republican members of Congress.

A Jones remark about environmental justice also landed him in trouble. He was accused of race-baiting for suggesting that "[t]he white polluters and the white environmentalists are essentially steering poison into the people of color's communities because they don't have a racial justice frame."

During the presidential campaign, Obama repeatedly threw aides overboard who became political liabilities; White House observers saw Jones' departure more as a matter of when rather than if.

His fate was sealed when Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs declined to defend him at a recent press conference.

QUESTION: Van Jones. I know he has issued an apology for his proctological remarks, but apparently there is also video of him accusing white polluters of poisoning people of color communities. Does the president still have confidence in this guy?

GIBBS: He continues to work in the administration, and I would refer you to the statement that CEQ put out last night about this.

QUESTION: CEQ?

GIBBS: That's the Council on Environmental Quality

QUESTION: Yeah, but Robert is that as far as you are going to go with this?

GIBBS: That is the statement that has been put out last night.

QUESTION: The stories on television have been pretty offensive.

GIBBS: And I think if you refer to the statement, he apologized.

QUESTION: Van Jones. His name appears on a 2004 petition, demanding to know the truth about 9/11, whether or not the Bush Administration played a role in 9/11 so as to justify a war for oil. He said in his statement yesterday that he doesn't agree with that, and an administration source said he didn't fully read it before he signed it, he agreed to have his name signed to it. Now it comes out today that in 2002 he was on an organizing committee for a 9/11 Truther march. Your administration has been very active in knocking down the so-called Birthers, the people who allege without any evidence, and despite all evidence to the contrary, that the president was not born in the United States. How can the administration tolerate somebody who subscribes to a different insane conspiracy theory, as a senior adviser?

GIBBS: Again, it is not something that the president agrees with, and again I would point you to the statement from CEQ.

QUESTION: How many past statements have to emerge before he no longer has the confidence of the president?

GIBBS: A good question for next time.

Jones' resignation, coming around midnight on the Saturday of a three-day weekend, minimizes the amount of time Beck and his allies can spend celebrating.

"It has been a great honor to serve my country and my President in this capacity. I thank everyone who has offered support and encouragement. I am proud to have been able to make a contribution to the clean energy future. I will continue to do so, in the months and years ahead," Jones said.