Bloomberg.com: U.S.White House Says Rove Retains Bush's Backing After CIA Leak
July 12 (Bloomberg) -- President George W. Bush still has confidence in Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove, administration spokesman Scott McClellan said, after Rove's name surfaced in the investigation into who disclosed the name of a covert intelligence agent.
``Any individual who works here at the White House has the confidence of the president,'' McClellan said in response to questions about Rove at the daily White House briefing. ``Everybody who is working here is helping us to advance an agenda, and that includes Karl in a big way.''
Earlier today, during an appearance with Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, Bush ignored reporters' questions about whether Rove should be fired.
For the second consecutive day, McClellan refused to answer questions about Rove's role in the case, in which an independent prosecutor is investigating the leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame's name to reporters in 2003. It's a federal crime to intentionally reveal the identity of a covert agent.
McClellan said investigators ``certainly expressed a preference'' that he and other members of the administration not discuss the case.
Democrats, including Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, the party's 2004 presidential nominee, called on Bush to fire Rove, the president's top political adviser and the architect of Bush's two presidential election victories.
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The July 18 issue of Newsweek reported that Rove told Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper that diplomat Joseph Wilson's 2002 trip to Niger to investigate whether Iraq tried to buy uranium there was authorized by his wife, ``who apparently works'' at the CIA. Newsweek cited an e-mail Cooper sent to his editors that the magazine said has been turned over to the prosecutor. Newsweek reported that Rove's lawyer, Robert Luskin, said Rove never mentioned Plame's name or that she was a covert agent.
Cooper and another reporter, Judith Miller of the New York Times, were ordered to disclose their sources to the prosecutor investigating the leak, and Miller is now in jail for refusing. Cooper agreed to testify. Plame's name surfaced after Wilson wrote an opinion article for the New York Times criticizing the Bush's administration's case for going to war in Iraq.
At issue are past statements by McClellan, who in September and October 2003, denied Rove's involvement in the leak. ``They assured me that they were not involved in this,'' McClellan said on Oct. 10, 2003, referring to Rove, Deputy National Security Adviser Elliot Abrams and Lewis Libby, Cheney's chief of staff.
McClellan said today that any comment now might compromise the investigation.
``The investigation is continuing. I want to be helpful to the investigation. I don't want to jeopardize anything in that investigation,'' McClellan said. ``I look forward to talking about some of these matters once the investigation is complete.''
Kerry and Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid cited past statements by McClellan and Bush that anyone involved in the leak should be fired.
``We are asking the President and the White House to do what they promised,'' Kerry said in an e-mail to supporters.
