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June 21st,
2008 - McClellan Testifies he was Wary of Libby’s Leak Denial but went along News article by the Los Angeles
Times |
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McClellan Testifies he was Wary
of Libby’s Leak Denial but went along The ex-press secretary who wrote a memoir of his White House days
tells a House panel he was 'reluctant' to back Cheney's chief of staff but
that Libby unequivocally denied exposing Valerie Plame's id By Johanna Neuman Los Angeles Times June 21, 2008 Washington - Former White
House Press Secretary Scott McClellan, testifying before the House Judiciary
Committee on Friday, said he was suspicious of I. Lewis "Scooter"
Libby's denial that he had leaked the name of a CIA agent but had no choice but
to go along with it. McClellan's testimony came
shortly after his author's tour for "What Happened: Inside the Bush
White House and Washington's Culture of Deception," the memoir that
created a stir in the capital when it was published last month. McClellan told the panel
that former White House Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr. asked him to
publicly exonerate Libby from involvement in the case, as McClellan had done
for White House political advisor Karl Rove. Libby was then chief of staff to
Vice President Dick Cheney. "I was reluctant to do
it," McClellan said. "I got on the phone with Scooter Libby and
asked him point-blank, 'Were you involved in this in any way?' And he assured
me in unequivocal terms that he was not." Libby was later convicted of
lying to investigators about his role in leaking the identity of then-CIA
operative Valerie Plame in an effort to discredit her husband, longtime
diplomat Joseph C. Wilson IV, a critic of the Bush administration's stated
reasons for invading Iraq. Libby was sentenced to 30 months in prison, but
President Bush commuted his sentence. In opening remarks before
the committee, McClellan repeated the charge in his book that the White House
had tilted the evidence to convince the public of the need for war in Iraq.
"It's public record that they were ignoring caveats and ignoring
contradictory intelligence," he said. "I do not know whether
a crime was committed by any of the administration officials who revealed
Valerie Plame's identity to reporters," he said. "Nor do I know if
there was an attempt by any person or persons to engage in a cover-up during
the investigation. I do know that it was wrong to reveal her identity,
because it compromised the effectiveness of a covert official for political
reasons. I regret that I played a role, however unintentionally, in relaying
false information to the public about it." He was particularly biting
about Rove, saying that he doubted the former White House advisor would tell
the truth to the committee, which has asked him to testify about his role in
the Plame leak. "I would hope that he
would be willing to do so," McClellan said. "Based on my own
experiences, I have some doubts. He lied to me." Rove had also leaked Plame's
name to reporters. Asked if Rove had lied to the president about the Plame
matter, McClellan said, "I believe so." McClellan was lionized by
some representatives - Chairman John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) called his
sentiments "noble" -- but attacked by others as a disgruntled
ex-White House employee out to settle scores. "Who is the real Scott
McClellan?" asked the committee's ranking Republican, Rep. Lamar Smith
of Texas. "The one who actually wrote in his book that the
administration did not employ 'deception'? ... Or the one who elsewhere in the
same book leveled self-serving accusations?" Smith added, "While we
may never know the answers, Scott McClellan alone will have to wrestle with
whether it was worth selling out the president and his friends for a few
pieces of silver." McClellan hit back at former
White House colleagues for "unsavory" reaction to his book, saying
that some sought "to turn it into a game of 'gotcha,' misrepresenting
what I wrote and seeking to discredit me through inaccurate personal attacks
on my motives." The attacks continued Friday
as White House spokesman Tony Fratto told reporters, "I think Scott has
probably told everyone everything he doesn't know, so I don't know if anyone
should expect him to say anything new today." During an afternoon of
questioning, McClellan was asked why Bush, who had a reputation as governor
of Texas for reaching out to Democrats, had become such a partisan figure in
Washington. Speculating that Bush succumbed to "the way Washington
works," McClellan said that although Bush was responsible for the course
of his own presidency, Cheney and Rove were "negative influences on
him." Rep. Robert Wexler (D-Fla.)
asked McClellan whether he thought Cheney authorized Libby to leak Plame's
identity. "I can't rule it out," McClellan said. Calling McClellan's testimony
an "enormously important ... glimpse into the truth," Wexler
suggested impeachment proceedings. "Cheney is the only likely
suspect" for authorizing the leak, Wexler said. Pressed on whether he had
ever witnessed the president misrepresent facts, McClellan repeated the
accusation from his book that Bush declassified a national intelligence
estimate to promote the war in Iraq. "We had decried the
leaking of national security information for years," he said. "This
was a very disillusioning moment for me, to say the least." Republicans expressed
disdain for McClellan's motives, suggesting that he had disclosed secrets for
maximum book sales rather than policy goals. Rep. Ric Keller (R-Fla.)
questioned why McClellan had disclosed that Bush pretended not to remember
his cocaine use of 30 years before. McClellan explained that
Bush's willingness to fudge his memory on a personal issue "later
transferred over" into how the administration attempted to sell the war. Asked Rep. Steve King
(R-Iowa), "Could you not have taken some of this with you to the grave?" External link: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/politics/la-na-mcclellan21-2008jun21,0,5383338.story McClellan Testifies About
Bush Team Former Spokesman Says Little Beyond Details in His Book By Dan Eggen Washington Post June 21, 2008 Scott McClellan, the former
White House spokesman turned Bush administration critic, took to Capitol Hill
yesterday to decry an insular and secretive White House that he said lied
about the leaking of a CIA officer's name and "overstated" intelligence
in the rush to war in Iraq. McClellan, who served as
President Bush's press secretary from 2003 to 2006 and is the author of a
controversial new book, also said Bush squandered the public's trust by not
following through on promises to fire those involved in disclosing the
identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame Wilson and to publicly divulge details
about the case. "The continuing cloud
of suspicion over the White House is not something I can remove, because I
know only one part of the story," McClellan said during several hours of
testimony before the House Judiciary Committee. "Only those who know the
underlying truth can bring this to an end. Sadly, they remain silent." McClellan was a longtime
Bush aide whose best-selling book, "What Happened: Inside the Bush White
House and Washington's Culture of Deception," has caused a political
uproar. It contains sharp criticism of the president and his senior aides on
a variety of topics, including the handling of prewar intelligence and the
bungled response to Hurricane Katrina. The former Bush insider
received a warm welcome from the judiciary panel's Democratic majority, which
attempted, generally without success, to get him to go beyond the material in
his book. Republicans, meanwhile, lined up to question McClellan's motives,
attack his publishing house and pressing him on why he did not raise doubts
while on the job. "While we may never
know the answers, Scott McClellan alone will have to wrestle with whether it
was worth selling out the president and his friends for a few pieces of
silver," said Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Tex.), the panel's ranking Republican. The partisan tenor of the
hearing appeared to illustrate one of McClellan's central arguments: that
Washington is seized by a "permanent campaign" that adheres to a
"philosophy of politics as war," as he put it yesterday. "Too often in
Washington, people mistakenly think that loyalty to an individual
officeholder should override loyalty to basic ideals," McClellan said in
his opening remarks. "This false loyalty is not only mistaken but can
exercise a corrupt influence on government." The White House, which has
been unusually sharp in its criticism of a former loyalist, generally tried
to ignore McClellan yesterday. "I think Scott has probably told everyone
everything he doesn't know, so I don't know if anyone should expect ... to
see anything new today," spokesman Tony Fratto told reporters traveling
with Bush. McClellan returned to
several key points during his testimony, including his stance that the Bush administration
"sold the nation on the premise that Iraq was a grave and gathering
danger" by using intelligence reports that were "overstated"
and "overpackaged." At the same time, McClellan
emphasized that he did not believe that Bush or his aides purposely misled
the country about Iraq. Judging from his testimony
and book, McClellan was particularly unhappy about the way the Wilson case
was handled, including his unwitting role in passing on inaccurate
information to reporters. McClellan recounted a
September 2003 episode, described in his book, that revolved around I. Lewis
"Scooter" Libby, Vice President Cheney's top aide at the time, and
Karl Rove, then political aide to Bush. After receiving assurances from Rove,
McClellan had told reporters that Rove was not involved in the disclosure of
Wilson's identity to the media. Andrew Card, who was Bush's
chief of staff, contacted McClellan on a Saturday and said that Bush and
Cheney wanted him to provide the same public assurances about Libby. After
speaking to Libby, McClellan said, he informed reporters that Libby was not
involved. Courtroom testimony and
other evidence later showed that both Rove and Libby had spoken to reporters
about Wilson, although neither was the initial source for Robert D. Novak,
whose column was at the heart of the case. Libby was later convicted of lying
and obstructing justice. Bush commuted Libby's prison sentence, a move that
McClellan criticized. McClellan was particularly
acerbic in his criticism of Rove. He indicated that he believes Rove misled
Bush about his involvement in the Wilson case and said that he would not
trust testimony from Rove that was not under oath. He also said Bush should
have followed through on his promise to fire anyone involved with the leak,
including Rove. "If he had adhered to
his word, then Karl Rove wouldn't have ... been in the administration,"
he said. Fratto said the
administration is still limited in what it can say about the case because of
an ongoing civil lawsuit by Wilson and her husband, former ambassador Joseph
C. Wilson IV. "I'm not sure, but maybe McClellan has forgotten the
policy, although he repeated it many times from the podium," Fratto said
in an e-mail. Rove declined to comment. External link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/story/2008/06/20/ST2008062001160.html |