NYDailyNews

Prez Aims to Plug Congress Leaks

WASHINGTON Furious about loose-lipped legislators, President Bush has ordered his anti-terrorism war council to sharply limit briefings to Congress on key details of the retaliation for the Sept. 11 attacks, aides said yesterday.

In a terse memo, Bush instructed the top officials running the war on terrorism to take personal control of the briefings — and offer them to only eight top members of Congress.

Bush said only the House speaker and minority leader and the Senate majority and minority leaders would be briefed, along with the chairman and ranking minority member of each chamber's intelligence committee.

His anger over leaks has been building since Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) talked about U.S. evidence on Osama Bin Laden. Last week, word also leaked out that senators had been told in a classified briefing there was a 100% likelihood of terrorist retaliation.

Timothy J. Burger

Original Publication Date: 10/9/01

-- Anonymous, October 09, 2001

Answers

Bush Wants Classified Info Protected

The Associated Press
Monday, Oct. 8, 2001; 6:04 p.m. EDT

WASHINGTON –– In the days leading up to this week's attacks on Afghanistan, President Bush clamped down on the sharing of classified information with Congress.

Bush sent a memo Friday to the attorney general, the secretaries of State, Treasury, and Defense, and the CIA and FBI directors, instructing them on "protecting American lives" and maintaining "the proper level of confidentiality" of classified or sensitive law enforcement information.

The president and White House officials were upset after details from last Tuesday's intelligence briefings on Capitol Hill found their way into news articles.

"We have an obligation to protect military, operational security, intelligence sources, and methods, and sensitive law enforcement investigations," Bush wrote, outlining procedures:

–Only the principals themselves, or officers expressly designated by the principals, are allowed to brief members of Congress.

–Classified or sensitive briefings will be given only to the House speaker, House minority leader, Senate minority and majority leaders, and the chairmen and ranking members on the intelligence committees.

Bush wrote that he had similarly informed House and Senate leaders that same morning. The policy "shall remain in effect until you receive further notice from me," he said.

White House spokeswoman Ann Womack called the memo a "pro forma communication, standard procedure" and said it was not written out of anger over any particular leaks.

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notice that this story says "it was not written out of anger over any particular leaks"

ROTFL

also.......IS condit a "ranking member" of the intelligence committee?????

-- Anonymous, October 09, 2001

Worse, mebs. Because he's on the Intellgience Committee, he's automatically on the Anti-Terrorist Committee.

-- Anonymous, October 09, 2001

Was reading the thread at Lucianne about this and just LMAO. These idiots we have in congress. I suppose some idiot thought he/she would buy favors with the press by leaking this info.

-- Anonymous, October 09, 2001