The Justice Department annnounced an indictment against Arizona Rep. Richard Renzi Thursday.

(CNN) — Rep. Richard Renzi of Arizona has been reindicted on 43 criminal counts by a federal grand jury in Arizona, adding racketeering and tax allegations to previous charges, the Justice Department announced Thursday.

The superseding indictment stems from a land deal that allegedly netted Renzi more than $700,000 in exchange for supporting legislation. It comes as Renzi, a Republican, prepares to leave office and face a criminal trial.

He announced he would not seek re-election after he was indicted last February.

Three other defendants also were named in the new indictment.

WASHINGTON (CNN) — A federal judge in Washington Monday allowed two private watchdog groups to sue the White House in a case involving potentially millions of missing e-mails.

U.S. District Judge Henry Kennedy rejected a Bush administration request to throw out a suit by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) and the National Security Archive. The government had argued the courts do not have the authority to require the White House to try to retrieve the e-mails in question.

CREW and the National Security Archive are trying to force White House officials to order the attorney general to initiate action to restore the deleted e-mails before they become irrecoverable.

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(CNN) — FBI agents investigating the hacking of a personal email account belonging to Alaska governor Sarah Palin have searched the home of the son of a Democratic state legislator, federal law enforcement sources said Monday.

The search occurred late Saturday and early Sunday at the Knoxville home of David Kernell, 20, son of Memphis Democrat Mike Kernell.

Officially, Justice Department spokeswoman Laura Sweeney acknowledged Monday only that "investigative activity occurred" over the weekend. But three sources familiar with the case confirmed the search of Kernell's residence. No documents have been made public showing what equipment or evidence agents had seized.

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WASHINGTON (CNN) – A federal judge Monday promised to rule "as soon as possible" on a Congressional demand for White House documents and testimony, but not before expressing reluctance to do so, and scolding both parties for refusing to compromise.

"I didn't volunteer for this," lamented U.S. District Court Judge John Bates during a contentious three-hour hearing focusing on the balance of powers between the executive and legislative branches.

The battle stems from the House investigation of the controversial firing of nine U.S. attorneys by the Justice Department.

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The White House won a ruling in federal court Monday in a lawsuit about its computer system and e-mails.

WASHINGTON (CNN) — The White House Office of Administration is not required to turn over records about a trove of possibly missing emails, a federal judge in Washington ruled Monday.

A ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly says the agency does not have "substantial independent authority" so is not subject to the Freedom of Information Act. Therefore, the White House does not have to disclose documents relating to its troubled e-mail system. That system developed problems which may have caused millions of White House emails to be unaccounted for.

The watchdog organization Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington–known as CREW– had sued under the Freedom of Information Act. The group expressed disappointment in the ruling and said it is appealing the decision.

"The Bush administration is using the legal system to prevent the American people from discovering the truth about the millions of missing White House e-mails," said CREW Executive Director Melanie Sloan.

In January, the White House said it cannot rule out that it may have lost certain e-mails. The possibly lost e-mails are from a period in which the United States decided to go to war with Iraq, White House officials leaked the identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame Wilson and the Justice Department started a criminal investigation into who leaked the information.

The White House has denied any evidence, including e-mails, have been destroyed.

Sen. Hillary Clinton campaigned in South Dakota last week.

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Federal election monitors are being dispatched to South Dakota to protect Native American voting rights on Tuesday, the final day of primary elections in the Democratic presidential nomination race.

Officials in the Justice Department's civil rights division announced they would send an unspecified number of observers "to watch and record activities during voting hours at polling locations" in Todd, Shannon, Bennett, Jackson, and Mellette counties in South Dakota.

Native Americans comprise more than 94 percent of the population in Shannon County, and 85 percent of the population in Todd County. More than 40 percent of residents in the two counties live below the poverty line.

Native Americans make up more than 8 percent of the state's population, making them the largest minority group in South Dakota.

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WASHINGTON (CNN) — An exhaustive Justice Department investigation has concluded the FBI did not participate in harsh interrogations of suspected terrorists detained in Guantanamo Bay, Afghanistan, or Iraq, and generally reported such potentially illegal actions by the CIA and Defense Department.

In "only a few instances" did FBI agents use techniques that were not approved by FBI policies, according to the long-awaited report by the Justice Department's inspector general.

But the Inspector General Glenn Fine criticized the FBI for being slow in developing and distributing its interrogation policy to deployed FBI interrogators. Although the decision to avoid use of harsh techniques was made by the FBI in August 2002, it was not put in writing until 2004, along with the requirement that the harsh techniques used by other agencies should be reported to the FBI chain of command.

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