www.mysanantonio.com/news/loca…

"AUSTIN — Aides to Gov. Rick Perry offered Travis County District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg continued employment in the district attorney's office if she resigned her elected post following a drunk-driving arrest, officials familiar with the offer said Thursday.

The offer came after Perry threatened and then vetoed $7.5 million in funding for the office's anti-corruption unit, known as the Public Integrity Unit, because Lehmberg had refused to step down.

But several officials and sources told the Express-News that Perry — through intermediaries — offered various options to Lehmberg to entice her resignation, culminating in promises to restore funding to the unit, another position in the District Attorney's office, and selection of her top lieutenant to serve as the new district attorney.

The offer was explicit; “they were clear,” the elected official said.

Travis County Commissioner Gerald Daughtery, a Republican, said he reached out to Perry's office following the veto to see if there was some way to restore state funding for the anti-corruption Public Integrity Unit. He said that negotiations eventually included allowingDemocrats, who dominate Travis County politics, to essentially pick Lehmberg's replacement.

“There was this massive amount of fear that if Rosemary steps down, it's the governor who gets to appoint someone,” Daughtery said. A Lehmberg aide was floated as a potential replacement to make it palatable to Democrats.

Travis County Judge Sam Biscoe confirmed that Perry's office had said that Lehmberg would be replaced with another Democrat who was currently working in the District Attorney's office.

“Then the offer was made, I was told, that the Governor would appoint a Democrat, and preferably one already working in the DA's office,” he said.

Biscoe added that he had never directly communicated with either Perry or his staff during the talks.

Two sources told the Express-News identified First Assistant District Attorney John Neal as the replacement.

In late July, the offer was sweetened again, the two sources said, when the Governor's office communicated that Lehmberg would be allowed to remain at the District Attorney's office in another capacity if she resigned her elected position.

The details about the governor's offer to Lehmberg come to light as a Travis County grand jury convenes to look into allegations that Perry, the state's longest serving governor, broke the law by threatening to veto the Public Integrity Unit funding to force Lehmberg to step down.

She refused and Perry carried through on his threat.

A special prosecutor, San Antonio attorney Michael McCrum, was named to investigate the charges.

McCrum told the Express-News last month that he did not know if there was wrongdoing on Perry's party, but he said he was “concerned about different aspects of how all this happened, and that includes the governor's actions.”

The Travis County District Attorney spokesman Rudy Magallanes said Lehmberg had no comment on the matter.

The governor's office did not offer an immediate comment on the claims.

But previously, the office had defended Perry's actions as a constitutional use of his veto authority. In a statement, Perry said he axed the money because Lehmberg was unfit to remain in office.

“Despite the otherwise good work (of) the Public Integrity Unit's employees, I cannot in good conscience support continued state funding for an office with statewide jurisdiction at a time when the person charged with ultimate responsibility of that unit has lost the public's confidence.”"

Yeah; the argument for Perry that she should have resigned because her drunk driving made her unfit to run the Public Integrity Unit basically falls flat when the fact of the matter is this: Perry offered Lehmberg a job in her own District Attorney's office if she resigned. It's completely bonkers to claim moral ethics on threatening to veto because of refusal to resign as he was offering her a job within the same DA she works for.