|
Waxman threatens Mukasey with contempt citation |
|
By Klaus Marre
|
|
Posted: 07/08/08 11:42 AM [ET] |
|
House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) on Tuesday threatened Attorney General Michael Mukasey with a contempt citation unless he provides the panel with documents related to the leak of the name of a CIA operative. Waxman’s committee issued a subpoena last month requesting the reports of FBI interviews with President Bush and Vice President Cheney. “You have neither complied with this subpoena by its returnable date nor asserted any privilege to justify withholding documents from the committee,” Waxman wrote in a letter to Mukasey. “In light of your actions, I am writing to inform you that the committee will meet on July 16, 2008, to consider a resolution citing you for contempt of Congress. I strongly urge you to comply with the duly issued subpoena before then.” The panel has been investigating the leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson’s name to the media and has been trying to get access to several documents that the Department of Justice has not released. “In deference to your concerns and in a further attempt at accommodation, the committee will not seek access to the report of the FBI interview of President Bush at this time,” Waxman added. “The report of the FBI interview with Vice President Cheney needs to be produced, however.” Cheney’s former chief of staff, I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, “told the FBI that it is ‘possible’ that the vice president instructed him to disseminate to the press information about the identity of Ms. Wilson,” Waxman stated. “The committee cannot complete its inquiry into this serious matter without the report of the vice president’s FBI interview.” The lawmaker cited a precedent in which an FBI interview report with then-Vice President Al Gore was submitted to the panel “despite the fact that it contained discussion of official White House business.” |
