Republicans returning from their week-long recess are trying to turn up the heat on the Obama administration over efforts by White House operatives to discuss the possibility of  jobs with two Democratic primary candidates if they dropped out of their races.

Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, the senior Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, said in a statement on Friday that he wanted hearings to investigate the issue.

“I am concerned that the Obama administration has engaged in a habit of attempting to manipulate the democratic election process to benefit the Democratic Party. Such actions are certainly unethical and may very well be criminal,” Smith said.

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), the ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, has previously said the Justice Department should appoint a special prosecutor to look into the allegations.

The swirl of accusations involving the White House, including back-room deal-making and promises of  jobs in exchange for political favors, has led some Republicans to suspect a juicy potential scandal. But as the facts are known, so far anyway, not many lawyers, not even Republican stalwarts, think anybody broke the law.

Steven G. Bradbury, the acting head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel under President George W. Bush, told Politico that the president can fill advisory positions in whatever method he wishes, including to “reward political loyalty.” His remarks followed those of former Attorney General Michael Mukasey who has said that finding criminality was “really a stretch.”

Bradbury offered a fuller legal analysis. ”Under the Constitution,” he said, “ it’s the president’s prerogative to fill advisory positions in the White House and to decide who will occupy senior policy offices across the administration,” said Bradbury, who suggested that Congress should not attempt to criminalize the appointment process.

“The president may make those appointment decisions for any reason he deems appropriate,” Bradbury said, “ including to reward political loyalty, and it would raise serious constitutional issues if Congress tried to prohibit the president, or anyone acting on his behalf, from offering appointments in particular circumstances.”

“For that reason,” Bradbury continued, “any statute that purports to criminalize an offer of appointment must be construed, if at all possible, not to interfere with the president’s constitutional authority, and if the statute cannot be read to avoid that result, there’s a strong argument it would be unconstitutional as so applied.”

Justice Department officials have expressed no interest in opening an inquiry. The White House has defended its actions. In one case, according to a report issued last week by White House counsel Robert Bauer, Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel asked former President Bill Clinton to raise the possibility of an unpaid presidential appointment to Rep. Joe Sestak (D-PA), who was challenging and defeated Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA) in the Pennsylvania Democratic primary.

This week another episode emerged. Colorado senatorial candidate Andrew Romanoff said that White House Deputy Chief of Staff Jim Messina brought up three positions that he might be interested in as an alternative to running against the administration’s preferred candidate, incumbent Sen. Michael Bennet.

Peter Zeidenberg, a former Justice Department prosecutor who worked in the Public Integrity Section and now works at DLA Piper, had earlier said that the Sestak offer wasn’t a crime.

“It sounds like political horsetrading and I don’t think a prosecutor would have any interest in prosecuting such a case. It doesn’t sound to me anything like a bribe,” Zeidenberg said. “You’d be laughed out of the courtroom.”

Stephanie Villafuerte (gov)

The nominee to be the U.S. Attorney for Colorado has rejected allegations that she played a role in the use of a restricted government database to aid Gov. Bill Ritter (D) in his 2006 gubernatorial campaign, The Denver Post reported today.

Stephanie Villafuerte, who is Ritter’s deputy chief of staff, wrote in a letter to Sen. Mark Udall (D-Colo.) obtained by The Post that her answer to the allegation is “emphatically no.”

Colorado Republicans have also raised questions about whether Villafuerte had discussions with staffers in the Denver District Attorney’s Office about an illegal immigrant who was featured in an ad against Ritter produced by Republican Bob Beauprez’s gubernatorial campaign.

Use of the federal criminal records database for political purposes could be a crime. She told the FBI in 2007 that she had “no conversations” with the DA employees about Carlos Estrada-Medina, who is also an alleged heroin dealer. Estrada-Medina had once obtained a plea deal under the alias of Walter Ramo when Ritter was Denver’s district attorney, according to The Post.

“Was I honest when I told the FBI that I did not have conversations with anyone at the Denver District Attorney’s Office . . . regarding the Ramo/Estrada Medina case?” Villafuerte wrote. “The answer is absolutely yes.”

Republicans charge that Villafuerte is being treated differently in the matter than U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent Cory Voorhis, who lost his job after accessing the same database on behalf of the Beauprez campaign. Colorado state Sen. Ted Harvey and other state Republicans sent a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee earlier this month, asking the panel to investigate whether Villafuerte used the database.

The committee has yet to schedule a vote on her nomination. President Barack Obama tapped Villafuerte for the post on Sept. 30.