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WASHINGTON — Sen. Pete Domenici and Rep. Heather Wilson aren't saying whether they contacted then-U.S. Attorney David Iglesias in the weeks leading up to the Nov. 7 elections about the pace of his corruption investigation of New Mexico Democrats.

Iglesias, whose last day on the job was Wednesday, says two members of New Mexico's congressional delegation pressured him to speed up the indictment of Democrats. Iglesias has refused to say who called him, but the three other members of the state's delegation say it wasn't them.

Domenici and Wilson, Albuquerque Republicans, have not returned phone calls from numerous news outlets asking for a response to Iglesias' allegations.

The former U.S. attorney is expected to be called before Congress to testify on his dismissal, which he says appears to have been politically motivated.

A House Judiciary subcommittee was expected to issue subpoenas this afternoon for Iglesias and three other U.S. attorneys dismissed by the Bush administration to appear at a hearing Tuesday.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers said the charge by Iglesias "is the most egregious allegation so far that the administration has allowed partisan politics to corrupt the selection and retention of U.S. attorneys."

In an interview with The Tribune on Tuesday, Iglesias said he did not know why he was ousted, but said it wasn't because of his job performance. "That only leaves one possibility," he said, "and that's politics."

He went further in an interview with McClatchy News Service, saying he believes his ouster was called for because he would not rush the indictments in a local kickback investigation.

"I believe that because I didn't `play ball,' so to speak, I was asked to resign," Iglesias said in the story published Wednesday. Iglesias said he was contacted directly by two members of Congress and "was appalled by the inappropriateness of these contacts."

At the time, Wilson was locked in a close re-election race with then-state Attorney General Patricia Madrid, whom Wilson had accused of neglecting corruption. Domenici has long been seen as Wilson's mentor in Congress.

The corruption investigation Iglesias was working on involves rumored kickbacks to powerful Democrats and other officials during the construction of Albuquerque's Metro Courthouse and several other buildings in Downtown.

A U.S. Justice Department official, Brian Roehrkasse, told McClatchy that Iglesias' claim "is flatly false."

"We had a lengthy record from which to evaluate his performance as a manager, and we made our decision not to further extend his service based on performance-related concerns," Roehrkasse said.

The Justice Department was unaware Iglesias had had conversations with members of Congress until Wednesday, Roehrkasse said. According to Roehrkasse, Iglesias should have reported the contact to department officials.

Roehrkasse would not say whether any member of the New Mexico delegation recommended that Iglesias be dismissed.

But Matt Farrauto, executive director of the New Mexico Democratic Party, on Wednesday called for Wilson to answer questions about Iglesias' dismissal, and whether she played a role in it.

"It's not much of a leap to believe that Heather Wilson pressured or personally instigated pressure for an indictment," Farrauto said. "This should be investigated, and she should be held accountable."

Sen. Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, said on the Senate floor Wednesday that Iglesias told members of his staff on Tuesday about being contacted by the two members of Congress, and Iglesias asked to be brought to Washington "under the power of subpoena to tell his story."

Iglesias is one of eight U.S. attorneys fired in December, but until Wednesday he had not been a central figure in the controversy. Democrats had focused on the firing of Carol Lamm, who successfully prosecuted former U.S. Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, a California Republican, on corruption charges, and on Little Rock, Ark., U.S. Attorney H.E. Cummings, who was replaced by an associate of White House political chief Karl Rove.

"These new revelations are extremely troubling," Schumer said on the Senate floor. "They would show politics at its worst, and the long hand of the Justice Department reaching out to fire attorneys who would not do what was politically asked; at least that's a very real suspicion.

"So we must get to the bottom of this. And the only way to get to the bottom of this is to call before us the fired U.S. attorneys and hear their side of the story."

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, a Vermont Democrat, today announced he will send letters to Iglesias and the other fired U.S. attorneys asking them to testify voluntarily. If they won't, he said the committee could vote March 8 on whether to issue subpoenas.

The president selects U.S. attorneys, who customarily resign with a change in administrations. However, it is unusual for an administration to replace someone it nominated in the first place.

"This is serious stuff," Schumer said. "When U.S. attorneys are fired for political reasons - fired to stand in the way of justice rather than promote justice - it puts a dagger into the heart of the faith that Americans have in their government and in their system of justice."

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat, cited Iglesias' story Wednesday in proposing an amendment to a homeland security bill that would limit the president's ability to replace U.S. attorneys with interim appointees.

The amendment would still allow the president to fire U.S. attorneys, but states that no interim appointee could serve more than 120 days. In effect that would force the president to send the name of a permanent nominee to the Senate for confirmation.

Carl Tobias, a constitutional law professor at the University of Richmond, said the administration's decision to replace so many U.S. attorneys at once without a clear explanation for the moves appeared to be backfiring.

"Now it's going to be a mess," he said. "The question is, what was to be gained by doing this? There's not even two years left in the administration. What was the point?"