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WHITE HOUSE PROCEDURES FOR SAFEGUARDING

CLASSIFIED INFORMATION

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT

AND GOVERNMENT REFORM

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

MARCH 16, 2007

Serial No. 110–28

Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/index.html

http://www.house.gov/reform

(II)

COMMITTEE ON OVERSISGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California, Chairman

TOM LANTOS, California

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

DIANE E. WATSON, California

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York

JOHN A. YARMUTH, Kentucky

BRUCE L. BRALEY, Iowa

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of

Columbia

BETTY MCCOLLUM, Minnesota

JIM COOPER, Tennessee

CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland

PAUL W. HODES, New Hampshire

CHRISTOPHER S. MURPHY, Connecticut

JOHN P. SARBANES, Maryland

PETER WELCH, Vermont

TOM DAVIS, Virginia

DAN BURTON, Indiana

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

CHRIS CANNON, Utah

JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio

DARRELL E. ISSA, California

KENNY MARCHANT, Texas

LYNN A. WESTMORELAND, Georgia

PATRICK T. MCHENRY, North Carolina

VIRGINIA FOXX, North Carolina

BRIAN P. BILBRAY, California

BILL SALI, Idaho

——— ———

PHIL SCHILIRO, Chief of Staff

PHIL BARNETT, Staff Director

EARLEY GREEN, Chief Clerk

DAVID MARIN, Minority Staff Director

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on March 16, 2007 ............................................................................ 1

Statement of:

Knodell, James, Director, Office of Security, Executive Office of the President, the White House; and William Leonard, Director, Information

Security Oversight Office, National Archives and Records Administration ................................................................................................................. 43

Knodell, James .......................................................................................... 43

Leonard, William ....................................................................................... 44

Wilson, Valerie Plame, former employee, Central Intelligence Agency ....... 17

Zaid, Mark, esquire; and Victoria Toensing, esquire ..................................... 72

Toensing, Victoria ...................................................................................... 74

Zaid, Mark ................................................................................................. 72

Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:

Davis, Hon. Tom, a Representative in Congress from the State of Virginia, prepared statement of ........................................................................ 15

Leonard, William, Director, Information Security Oversight Office, National Archives and Records Administration, prepared statement of ....... 46

Toensing, Victoria, esquire, prepared statement of ....................................... 77

Waxman, Chairman Henry A., a Representative in Congress from the

State of California, prepared statement of ................................................. 4

(1)

WHITE HOUSE PROCEDURES FOR

SAFEGUARDING CLASSIFIED INFORMATION

FRIDAY, MARCH 16, 2007

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM, Washington, DC.

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:16 a.m., in room

2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Henry A. Waxman

(chairman of the committee) presiding.

Present: Representatives Waxman, Cummings, Kucinich, Watson, Yarmuth, Van Hollen, Sarbanes, Davis of Virginia, and Westmoreland.

Staff present: Phil Schiliro, chief of staff; Phil Barnett, staff director and chief counsel; Kristin Amerling, general counsel; Karen

Lightfoot, communications director and senior policy advisor; David

Rapallo, chief investigative counsel; Roger Sherman, deputy chief

counsel; Theo Chuang, deputy chief investigative counsel; Michael

Gordon, senior investigative counsel; Susanne Sachsman, counsel;

Molly Gulland, assistant communications director; Earley Green,

chief clerk; Teresa Coufal, deputy clerk; Caren Auchman, press assistant; Zhongrui ‘‘JR’’ Deng, chief information officer; Bonney

Kapp, fellow; David Marin, minority staff director; Larry Halloran,

minority deputy staff director; Jennifer Safavian, minority chief

counsel for oversight and investigations; Anne Marie Turner and

Steve Castor, minority counsels; Christopher Bright, minority professional staff member; Nick Palarino, minority senior investigator

and policy advisor; Patrick Lyden, minority parliamentarian and

member services coordinator; Brian McNicoll, minority communications director; and Benjamin Chance, minority clerk.

Chairman WAXMAN. The meeting of the committee will come to

order. Today the committee is holding a hearing to examine how

the White House handles highly classified information.

In June and July 2003, one of the Nation’s most carefully guarded secrets, the identity of a covert CIA agent, Valerie Plame Wilson, was repeatedly revealed by White House officials to members

of the media.

This was an extraordinarily serious breach of our national security. President George W. Bush’s father, the former President Bush

said, ‘‘I have nothing but contempt and anger for those who exposed the names of our sources. They are, in my view, the most insidious of traitors.’’

Today we’ll be asking three questions. One, how did such a serious violation of our national security occur? Two, did the White

House take the appropriate investigative and disciplinary steps

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after the breach occurred? And three, what changes in White

House procedures are necessary to prevent future violations of our

national security from occurring?

For more than 3 years Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald has

been investigating the leak for its criminal implications. By definition, Mr. Fitzgerald’s investigation had an extremely narrow criminal focus. It did not answer the broader policy questions raised by

the release of Mrs. Wilson’s identity. Nor did it seek to ascribe responsibility outside of the narrow confines of the criminal law.

As the chief investigative committee in the House of Representatives, our role is fundamentally different than Mr. Fitzgerald’s. It

is not our job to determine criminal culpability. But it is our job

to understand what went wrong and to insist on accountability,

and to make recommendations to avoid future abuses. We begin

that process today.

This hearing is being conducted in open session. This is appropriate, but it is also challenging. Mrs. Wilson was a covert employee of the CIA. We cannot discuss all of the details of her CIA

employment in open session. I have met personally with General

Hayden, the head of the CIA, to discuss what I can and cannot say

about Mrs. Wilson’s service. And I want to thank him for his cooperation and help in guiding us along these lines.

My staff has also worked with the Agency to assure these remarks do not contain classified information.

I have been advised by the CIA that even now after all that has

happened, I cannot disclose the full nature, scope, and character of

Mrs. Wilson’s service to our Nation without causing serious damage to our national security interests.

But General Hayden and the CIA have cleared these following

comments for today’s hearing.

During her employment at the CIA, Mrs. Wilson was undercover.

Her employment status with the CIA was classified information,

prohibited by disclosure under Executive Order 12958.

At the time of the publication of Robert Novak’s column on July

14, 2003, Mrs. Wilson’s CIA employment status was covert. This

was classified information.

Mrs. Wilson served in senior management positions at the CIA

in which she oversaw the work for other CIA employees and she

attained the level of GS–14, step 6 under the Federal pay scale.

Mrs. Wilson worked on some of the most sensitive and highly secretive matters handled by the CIA. Mrs. Wilson served at various

times overseas for the CIA.

Without discussing the specifics of Mrs. Wilson’s classified work,

it is accurate to say that she worked on the prevention of the development and use of weapons of mass destruction against the United

States.

In her various positions at the CIA, Mrs. Wilson faced significant

risks to her personal safety and her life. She took on serious risks

on behalf of our country. Mrs. Wilson’s work in many situations

had consequences for the security of her colleagues, and maintaining her cover was critical to protecting the safety of both colleagues

and others.

The disclosure of Mrs. Wilson’s employment with the CIA had

several serious effects. First, it terminated her covert job opportuVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:42 Jan 22, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00006 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\38579.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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nities with the CIA. Second, it placed her professional contacts at

greater risk. And third, it undermined the trust and confidence

with which future CIA employees and sources hold the United

States. This disclosure of Mrs. Wilson’s classified employment status with the CIA was so detrimental that the CIA filed a crimes

report with the Department of Justice.

As I mentioned, Mrs. Wilson’s work was so sensitive that even

now, she is still prohibited from discussing many details of her

work in public because of the continuing risks to CIA officials and

assets in the field and in the CIA’s ongoing work.

Some have suggested that Mrs. Wilson did not have a sensitive

position with the CIA or a position of unusual risk. As a CIA employee, Mrs. Wilson has taken a life-long oath to protect classified

information even after her CIA employment has ended. As a result,

she cannot respond to most of the statements made about her.

I want to make clear, however, that any characterization that

minimizes the personal risk of Mrs. Wilson that she accepted in

her assignments is flatly wrong. There should be no confusion on

this point. Mrs. Wilson has provided great service to our Nation

and has fulfilled her obligation to protect classified information admirably and with confidence and she will uphold it again today.

That concludes the characterizations that the CIA is permitting

us to make today. To these comments, I want to add a personal

note. For many in politics, praising the troops and those who defend our freedom is second nature. Sometimes it is done in sincerity and sometimes it is done with cynicism, but almost always we

don’t really know who the people are. We don’t know they’re out

there, we don’t know who those people are that are out there. They

are our abstract heroes, whether they are serving in the armed

services or whether they’re serving in the CIA.

Two weeks ago this committee met some real heroes face-to-face

when we went to visit Walter Reed. Every Member was appalled

at what we learned. Our treatment of the troops didn’t match our

rhetoric. Fortunately, Mrs. Wilson hasn’t suffered physical harm

and faces much more favorable circumstances now than some of

the soldiers that we met last week. But she too has been one of

those people fighting to protect our freedom, and she, like thousands of others, was serving our country bravely and anonymously.

She didn’t ask that her identity be revealed but it was, repeatedly.

And that was an inexcusable breach of the responsibilities our

country owes to her.

Once again our actions did not match our rhetoric. I want to

thank Mrs. Wilson for the tremendous service she gave to our

country and recognize the remarkable personal sacrifices that she

and countless others have made to protect our national security.

You and your colleagues perform truly heroic work and what

happened to you not only should never have happened, but we

should all work to make sure it never happens again. Thank you

very much.

[The prepared statement of Chairman Henry A. Waxman follows:]

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Chairman WAXMAN. I want to yield to Mr. Davis, the ranking

member of our committee. And in doing so, I want to thank him

for his cooperation in this hearing. This has been a complicated

hearing. It is much more complicated than most of our hearings.

We had to decide what we could and what we couldn’t say, what

we could and couldn’t ask, whether it would be an open session or

closed session, etc. And I want to thank Mr. Davis for the tremendous cooperation he has given and I do recognize him at this point.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Thank you, Chairman Waxman. I want

to first start by congratulating you on your passage of important

reform legislation this week. We adopted bipartisan bills crafted in

this committee to strengthen the Freedom of Information Act, disclose donors to Presidential libraries, expand access to Presidential

records and to fortify most of all protections. Given those accomplishments, it is ironic that we in Sunshine Week of the annual observance of open government—with a more partisan hearing on

how to best keep secrets.

Let me state at the outset that the outing of Mrs. Wilson’s identity was wrong, and we have every right to look at this and investigate it. But I have to confess, I’m not sure what we’re trying to

accomplish today, given all the limitations that the chairman has

just described that have been put on us by the CIA.

I ostensibly called to examine White House procedures for handling and protecting classified information. The hearing’s lead witness never worked at the White House. If she knows about security

practices there, she can’t say much about them in a public forum.

We do know that she worked at the CIA. That now well-known fact

raises some very different questions about how critical and difficult

it is to protect the identity of individuals with covert status.

But, again, those are questions we probably can’t say much about

in a public forum without violating the various security safeguards

the majority claims to be worried about at the White House. Under

these circumstances, perhaps a hypothetical case is the best way to

describe the futility of trying to enforce the Intelligence Identities

Protection Act in this decidedly nonjudicial venue.

Let’s say, for example, a committee staff is told to identify a CIA

witness for a hearing on security practices. He or she calls the

Agency and asks to speak with official A. Official A is not in so the

call is routed to official B, who identifies him or herself by name

and title and answers the staffer’s question. Thinking official B

would be a fine witness, the staff then calls the Congressional Research Service or a friend at another committee to find out more

about official B, but official B happens to be a covert agent. In

passing the name, title and CIA affiliation around, has the staff

member violated the law against disclosure? Probably not. But you

would have to be looking through a pretty thick political prism to

see an intentional unauthorized disclosure in that context, and that

happened.

In the case of Mrs. Wilson, the majority stresses the fact the disclosure of her status triggered a crimes report by the CIA and the

Justice Department. Allegations against White House officials and

reporters were thoroughly vetted, but after spending 6 months and

millions of dollars, the special counsel charged no one with violations of the Intelligence Identities Protection Act. The lack of prosVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:42 Jan 22, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00017 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\38579.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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ecution under the act show those disclosures probably occurred in

a similarly nonintentional context, lacking the requisite knowledge

of covert status or the intention to disclose that status without authorization.

No process can be adopted to protect classified information that

no one knows is classified, just as no one can be prosecuted for unauthorized disclosure of information that no one ever said was protected. So this looks to me more like a CIA problem than a White

House problem. If the Agency doesn’t take sufficient precautions to

protect the identity of those who engage in covert work, no one else

can do it for them.

The same law meant to protect secret identities also requires an

annual report to Congress on the steps taken to protect the highly

sensitive information. But we’re told few if any such reports exist

from the CIA. Who knows what information needs to be protected

and how they are told. Is there a list officials can check against?

Do CIA briefers know when material given to executive branch officials references a covert agent, or are they cautioned not to repeat

the name? How is it made known, and to whom, when the 5-year

protection period for formerly covert agents has elapsed?

Those are the questions that need to be asked about the safeguards and classified information, but we won’t hear from the CIA

today because this is an open forum.

Given all that, I suspect we’re going to probably waste some time

talking about things we can’t talk about. And that is unfortunate.

Unfortunate an individual possibly still in a covert status was publicly identified, unfortunate executive branch officials got anywhere

near this media maelstrom rather than focus on more serious problems. That is a disappointment to me. And unfortunate that this

has become so politicized.

On this side, we’re not here to defend or attack anyone. In an

open session, we hope to shed some sunshine on the workings of

government. I have to say, I am not sure that’s going to happen

today, but I thank our witnesses for trying. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Tom Davis follows:]

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Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you very much, Mr. Davis.

Our first witness is Mrs. Valerie Plame Wilson. She is a former

covert CIA employee whose service to this country included work

involving the prevention of the development and use of weapons of

mass destruction against our Nation. Her employment status was

publicly disclosed in July 2003, effectively terminating her covert

job opportunities within the CIA.

Mrs. Wilson, it is the practice of this committee that all witnesses are administered an oath, and I would like to ask you to

stand and raise your right hand.

[Witness sworn.]

Chairman WAXMAN. The record will reflect the fact that the witness answered in the affirmative. Before we begin the questioning

period, I wanted to underscore to members of the committee that

while it is important that Mrs. Wilson have the opportunity to provide testimony that will help us understand the significance of the

disclosure of her CIA employment status, we should not be seeking

classified information from Mrs. Wilson in this open forum, and we

need to respect that she may in some cases have to decline to respond on the grounds of doing so would risk disclosure of sensitive

information.

Mrs. Wilson, we’re pleased to have you here. Thank you very

much for coming to our committee today. And I want to recognize

you for an opening statement. There is a button on the base of the

mic. Be sure to press it in and pull it closely enough to you so you

can be heard.

STATEMENT OF VALERIE PLAME WILSON, FORMER

EMPLOYEE, CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Good morning, Mr. Chairman and members

of the committee. My name is Valerie Plame Wilson and I am honored to be invited to testify under oath before the Committee on

Oversight and Government Reform on the critical issue of safeguarding classified information.

I am grateful for this opportunity to set the record straight. I

have served the United States loyally and to the best of my ability

as a covert operations officer for the Central Intelligence Agency.

I worked on behalf of the national security of our country, on behalf

of the people of the United States, until my name and true affiliation were exposed in the national media on July 14, 2003, after

a leak by administration officials.

Today I can tell this committee even more. In the run-up to the

war with Iraq, I worked in the Counterproliferation Division of the

CIA, still as a covert officer whose affiliation with the CIA was

classified. I was to discover solid intelligence for senior policymakers on Iraq’s presumed weapons of mass destruction programs.

While I helped to manage and run secret worldwide operations

against this WMD target from CIA headquarters in Washington, I

also traveled to foreign countries on secret missions to find vital intelligence.

I loved my career because I love my country. I was proud of the

serious responsibilities entrusted to me as a CIA covert operations

officer, and I was dedicated to this work. It was not common knowledge on the Georgetown cocktail circuit that everyone knew where

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I worked. But all of my efforts on behalf of the national security

of the United States, all of my training, all of the value of my years

of service were abruptly ended when my name and identity were

exposed irresponsibly.

In the course of the trial of Vice President Cheney’s former chief

of staff, Scooter Libby, I was shocked by the evidence that emerged.

My name and identity were carelessly and recklessly abused by

senior government officials in both the White House and the State

Department. All of them understood that I worked for the CIA, and

having signed oaths to protect national security secrets, they

should have been diligent in protecting me and every CIA officer.

The CIA goes to great lengths to protect all of its employees, providing at significant taxpayer’s expense painstakingly devised covers for its most sensitive staffers. The harm that is done when a

CIA cover is blown is grave, but I can’t provide details beyond that

in this public hearing. But the concept is obvious. Not only have

breaches of national security endangered CIA officers, it has jeopardized and even destroyed entire networks of foreign agents who,

in turn, risk their own lives and those of their families to provide

the United States with needed intelligence. Lives are literally at

stake.

Every single one of my former CIA colleagues, from my fellow

covert officers to analysts to technical operations officers to even

the secretaries, understand the vulnerabilities of our officers and

recognize that the travesty of what happened to me could happen

to them. We in the CIA always know that we might be exposed and

threatened by foreign enemies. It was a terrible irony that administration officials were the ones who destroyed my cover. Furthermore, testimony in the criminal trial of Vice President Cheney’s

former chief of staff, who has now been convicted of serious crimes,

indicates that my exposure arose from purely political motives.

Within the CIA it is essential that all intelligence be evaluated

on the basis of its merits and actual credibility. National security

depends upon it. The trade craft of intelligence is not a product of

speculation. I feel passionately as an intelligence professional about

the creeping insidious politicizing of our intelligence process. All intelligence professionals are dedicated to the idea that they would

rather be fired on the spot than distort the facts to fit a political

view, any political view or any ideology.

As our intelligence agencies go through reorganizations and experience the painful aspects of change and our country faces profound

challenges, injecting partisanship or ideology into the equation

makes effective and accurate intelligence that much more difficult

to develop. Politics and ideology must be stripped completely from

our intelligence services or the consequences will be even more severe than they have been and our country placed in even greater

danger.

It is imperative for any President to be able to make decisions

based on intelligence that is unbiased. The Libby trial and the

events leading to the Iraq War highlight the urgent need to restore

the highest professional standards of intelligence collection and

analysis and the protection of our officers and operations.

The Congress has a constitutional duty to defend our national security and that includes safeguarding our intelligence. That is why

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I am grateful for this opportunity to appear before this committee

today and to assist in its important work.

Thank you. And I welcome any questions.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you very much, Mrs. Wilson. We’ll

now proceed with 10 minutes on each side managed by the Chair

and the ranking member of the committee. For our first round, I

want to yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Kentucky, Mr.

Yarmuth, to begin the questioning.

Mr. YARMUTH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for being

here today, Mrs. Wilson. Our country owes you a great debt of gratitude for your service, and I think you are continuing that service

today by appearing.

I would like to start by asking you about July 14, 2003, the day

that Robert Novak wrote the column in the Chicago Sun Times,

identifying you as an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction.

But before I get to that, I want to ask you about the day before,

July 13. My understanding is that on that date, you were covert.

Is that correct? On July 13?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I was a covert officer, correct.

Mr. YARMUTH. Without destroying—or disclosing classified information, what does covert mean?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I’m not a lawyer. But my understanding is

that the CIA is taking affirmative steps to ensure that there are

no links between the operations officer and the Central Intelligence

Agency. I mean, that is simple.

Mr. YARMUTH. And as you said and my understanding is that

your work was classified for purposes of many regulations in the

laws, and we’re talking about your work was classified on that day,

July 13.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. That’s correct.

Mr. YARMUTH. Did the July 14 column destroy your covert position and your classified status?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, it did. I could no longer perform the

work for which I had been highly trained. I could no longer travel

overseas or do the work for which—my career which I loved. It was

done.

Mr. YARMUTH. And this may be a simplistic question, but the information that was disclosed in Robert Novak’s column, is it correct

to say that is information that you would not have disclosed yourself?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. That is correct.

Mr. YARMUTH. How did you react when you learned that your

identity had been disclosed?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I found out very early in the morning when

my husband came in and dropped the newspaper on the bed and

said, ‘‘He did it.’’ And I quickly turned and read the article, and

I felt like I had been hit in the gut. It was over in an instant, and

I immediately thought of my family’s safety, the agents and networks that I had worked with, and everything goes through your

mind in an instant.

Mr. YARMUTH. What effect did the leak have on you professionally?

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Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Professionally? Well, I could no longer do

the work which I had been trained to do. There was—after that,

there is no way that you can serve overseas in a covert capacity.

And so that career path was terminated.

Mr. YARMUTH. Did the leak make you feel that your entire career

had been thrown out the window essentially, it had been wasted

at all?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Not wasted, but certainly terminated prematurely.

Mr. YARMUTH. You talked a little bit about your concern about

the effect of the leak on your professional contacts. Did you have

any contact with those people who weren’t—expressed their concern about the effect on their professional career?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No, I did not. But I do know the Agency

did a damage assessment. They did not share it with me. But I

know that it certainly puts the people and the contacts I had all

in jeopardy, even if they were completely innocent in nature.

Mr. YARMUTH. And what effect do you think it had at the broadest level? I’m talking about for future CIA employees and future

sources.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I think it was—it had a very negative effect. If our government cannot even protect my identity, future foreign agents who might consider working with the Central Intelligence Agency and providing needed intelligence would think

twice. Well, they can’t even protect one of their own. How are they

going to protect me? As well as the Agency is working very hard

to attract highly talented young people into its ranks, because we

do have profound challenges facing our country today. And I can’t

think that helped those efforts.

Mr. YARMUTH. I can’t see the clock, Mr. Chairman. I don’t know

whether my time has expired or not.

Chairman WAXMAN. You have 9 seconds.

Mr. YARMUTH. Well, I will yield back the balance of my seconds

to you, Chairman. Thank you. Thank you, Mrs. Wilson.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you Mr. Yarmuth.

The Chair would now like to yield time to Mr. Hodes, the gentleman from New Hampshire.

Mr. HODES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mrs. Wilson, thank you

for coming today. What happened to you is deadly serious. You

were the victim of a national security breach. If this was a law enforcement context, something I am familiar with, it would be equivalent to disclosing the identity of an undercover police officer who

has put his life on the line and the lives of all those who helped

that officer.

Our job on this committee is to find out how the breach happened. Now, I would like to show you a chart that we prepared on

the committee. You will see it up on the screens, and we’re putting

it up here on paper. That chart is a graphic depiction of all the

ways that your classified CIA employment was disclosed to White

House officials and then to the press. Every colored block on that

chart is an individual, and every arrow shows a disclosure of classified information. That classified information was your CIA employment status. And the arrows are based on the testimony in Mr.

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Libby’s criminal case and press reports. This chart shows over 20

different disclosures about your employment.

Let me ask you, looking at this chart, are you surprised that so

many people had access to the classified information about your

CIA employment?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, I am, Congressman. And I am also

surprised at how carelessly they used it.

Mr. HODES. What was your expectation about how the government would handle the classified information about your work and

status?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. My expectation, Congressman, was that—

as of all CIA operations officers, every officer serving undercover,

that senior government officials would protect our identity. We all

take oaths to protect classified information and national security.

So——

Mr. HODES. Prior to the time that you learned that your status

had been disclosed, you never authorized anyone to disclose your

status, did you?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Absolutely not.

Mr. HODES. And no one ever approached you and asked for permission to disclose any classified information about you?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No.

Mr. HODES. Vice President Cheney never approached you and

asked if he had your permission to disclose your status, did he?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No.

Mr. HODES. Karl Rove never approached you and asked whether

he had your permission to disclose your status, did he?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No.

Mr. HODES. Now, this isn’t even a complete picture because as

you can see on this chart, we don’t know, for example, who told

Karl Rove your status. There is a black box up there, and it says

unknown. And there are two arrows from that. One pointing to

Vice President Cheney and one pointing to Karl Rove. So that is

an unanswered question right now.

Now, I can imagine that you have followed the proceedings and

the press pretty closely over the past few years, have you not?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes.

Mr. HODES. Do you have any theories about who told Karl Rove

about your status?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No, I do not. There was much evidence introduced in the Libby trial that provides quite a bit, but I have

no—it would just be guesses.

Mr. HODES. Well, that is what this committee’s investigation is

all about, following all the links in the chain from their sources to

their destination. Now, it has been reported that Mr. Rove had a

discussion with Chris Matthews about you, and the report was that

Mr. Rove told Mr. Matthews, Valerie Plame is fair game. Do you

recall that?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, I do.

Mr. HODES. I’d like to ask you to forget for a moment that he

was talking about you. Imagine that he was talking about another

undercover agent working on sensitive issues, and that undercover

agent, that undercover agent’s life was on the line. Do you have a

reaction to that?

22

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Absolutely. This happened to me, but I

would like to think I would feel just as passionately if it had happened to any of my former colleagues at the CIA.

Mr. HODES. One final question. Is there any circumstance that

you can think of that would justify leaking the name of an undercover agent?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No, Congressman.

Mr. HODES. Thank you very much. I yield back.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you, Mr. Hodes.

Before we yield our time, we have a long list of people that seem

to have either intentionally or advertently passed on your status

and your name as a CIA agent, and that included the President,

Vice President, Scooter Libby, Karl Rove, Ari Fleisher, just to name

a few.

Did any of those people, the President, the Vice President, Karl

Rove, Scooter Libby, Ari Fleisher, did any of them ever call you and

apologize to you?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No, Chairman.

Chairman WAXMAN. None of them ever called you to express regrets?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you. Mr. Davis.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Plame.

It’s clear that administration officials knew you worked for the

CIA, but did they know that your status was that of a covert

agent?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I have no way of knowing, but I can say

I worked for the Counterproliferation Division of the Directorate of

Operations. And while not all, many of the employees of that division are, in fact, in covert status.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. But you don’t have—I think one of the

issues here was not that you worked for the CIA, because that was

obviously widely known in the administration, but for the crime to

have been committed, they had to have known you were covert,

and you don’t have any direct linkage that they knew you were covert at that point.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Again, Congressman. I am not a lawyer,

but as I said——

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. You don’t have any direct knowledge.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No. But as I said in my opening comments,

the fact that they knew that I worked for the CIA, that alone

should have increased their level of diligence.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Look, we all agree that everybody needs

to protect national security and protect the identities of undercover

and covert agents. But should the CIA have done more to adequately protect people as well and say these covert agents shouldn’t

be outed? Did the CIA have a responsibility here as well?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I think that Congress might think about reviewing the Intelligence Identities Protection Act and seeing what

went wrong and where it needs to be perhaps rewritten.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. I mean,—look, the CIA is supposed to report to Congress each year on the steps taken to protect this highly

sensitive information. And I am told few, if any, reports are even

filed. So I think there is a responsibility from the CIA, and I think

23

what is missing and I think from—at least from a criminal perspective, not from a policy but from a criminal perspective, that the

special prosecutor in this case looked at that and found that the

people who may have been saying this didn’t know that you were

covert, and you didn’t have any evidence to the contrary?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. That, I think, is a question better put to

the special prosecutor, Congressman.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Shouldn’t the CIA have made sure that

anyone who knew your name and your work be told of your status?

Would that have been helpful in this case? That would have made

it very clear if anyone leaked it at that point they were violating

the law at least.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. The CIA does go to great lengths to create

and protect all kinds of covers for its officers. There is a lot of

money and a lot of time and a lot of energy that goes into that.

And the onus also—the burden falls on the officer himself or herself to live that cover, but it is not a perfect world.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. The Intelligence Identities Protection Act

makes it a crime to knowingly disclose the identity of a covert

agent, which has a specific definition under the act. Did anyone

ever tell you that you were so designated?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I’m not a lawyer.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. That’s why I asked if they told you. I’m

not asking for your interpretation.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No. But I was covert. I did travel overseas

on secret missions within the last 5 years.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. I’m not arguing with that. What I am

asking is, for purposes of the act—and maybe this just never occurred to you or anybody else at the time, but did anybody say that

you were so designated under the act, or was this just after it came

to fact?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No. No one told me that.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. How about after the disclosure? After the

disclosure did anyone then say, gee, you were designated under the

act. This should not have happened. Did anyone in the CIA tell you

at that point?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. OK. Since the disclosure of your identity,

have you been offered other positions within the CIA?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes. I went on to other jobs with commensurate responsibility.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. No demotion or anything? You didn’t experience any demotion?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Did anyone at the CIA tell you your career path was damaged by the disclosure?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Now, you were a senior manager, a GS–

14, step 6, eligible for a GS–15 at the time. Did anyone ever tell

you that you could not advance in a normal career path after this

exposure?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. It was very clear that I could not advance

as a covert operations officer.

24

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. And would that then—your upward career path in terms of getting a GS–15 then was impaired in your

opinion?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No. But that was the career for which I had

been trained, for which I wanted to do. My husband and I, after

our children were born, discussed going overseas again when they

were a little bit older, and all of that came to an abrupt end, obviously.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Do you know if any of the CIA colleagues—like Robert Grimere who testified at the Libby trial, that

he told administration officials that you were involved in sending

your husband to Niger—do you know if he ever told any of these

officials that you were involved?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I have no idea other than what he testified.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. OK. When you introduced yourself and

your husband to the group of IC analysts at the February 19, 2002

meeting at CIA headquarters, did you tell anybody present then

you were undercover?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No, I did not. I was in CIA headquarters.

I introduced them and left the meeting, Congressman.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. OK. Would they have known that you

were—would they have had any reason to have known you were

undercover or——

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I believe that they would have assumed

such.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. We’re limited in what we can ask. So

we’re trying to stay in the confines that the CIA has——

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I understand.

Let me just ask, try to put some of the speculation to rest and

give you an opportunity to answer. In January 2004, Vanity Fair

published an article, not always known for great accuracy, touching

on your role in the Niger uranium affair. It said—this is what they

said: In early May, Wilson and Plame attended a conference sponsored by the Senate Democratic Policy Committee at which Wilson

spoke about Iraq—one of the other panelists was New York Times

journalist Nicholas Kristof—over breakfast the next morning. It

was Kristof and his wife Wilson told about his trip to Niger and

said Kristof could write about it but not name him. Is that account

accurate?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I think it is. I had nothing—I was not

speaking to Mr. Kristof, and I think my husband did say that he

had undertaken this trip but not to be named as a source.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. OK. Just to be clear, the article says that

your husband met for breakfast with Kristof and his wife. Just to

be clear, were you at the breakfast?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Briefly. Yes, Congressman.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. OK. On June 13, Kristof wrote a column

about the Niger uranium matter. He wrote that he was piecing the

story from two people directly involved and two others who were

briefed on it. Do you know if you were one of those people that he

was referring to?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I can’t imagine that I would be. I did not

speak to him about it.

25

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. OK. What about your husband? Would

he have been one of the sources?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I think he was speaking to Mr. Kristof at

that point.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. OK. Was any of that information classified to your knowledge?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Not that I am aware of.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. I yield back at this point.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you very much.

Mr. Cummings for 5 minutes.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much.

Mrs. Wilson, first of all, let me thank you for your service. Mrs.

Wilson, even today your work for the CIA is so highly classified

that we’re not permitted to discuss the details. But we can clarify

one crucial point, whether you worked under cover for the CIA. You

said that your position was covert, but I have heard others say that

you were not covert. In fact, one of the witnesses who will testify

a little bit later, Victoria Toensing, is making that same argument.

In an op-ed that appeared in the Washington Post on February

18, she says it quite bluntly, she says, ‘‘Plame was not covert. She

worked at CIA headquarters and had not been stationed abroad

within 5 years.’’ I know there are restrictions on what you can say

today, but is Ms. Toensing’s statement correct?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Congressman, thank you for the opportunity. I know I am here under oath, and I am here to say that

I was a covert officer of the Central Intelligence Agency. Just like

a general is a general whether he is in the field in Iraq or Afghanistan, when he comes back to the Pentagon, he is still a general. In

the same way, covert operations officers who are serving in the

field, when they rotate back for a temporary assignment in Washington, they too are still covert.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Is it possible that Ms. Toensing had more information than you do about your work or had access to secret documents that you don’t?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I would find that highly unlikely, Congressman, because much of that information about my career is still

classified.

Mr. CUMMINGS. On Wednesday night, I know Mr. Waxman, our

Chair, and Congressman Reyes, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, spoke personally with General Hayden, the

head of the CIA. And Chairman Waxman told me that General

Hayden said clearly and directly, ‘‘Mrs. Wilson was covert.’’ There

was no doubt about it.

And by the way, the CIA has authorized us to be able to say

that. In addition, I understand that Chairman Waxman sent his

opening statement over to the CIA to be cleared and to make sure

that it was accurate. In it he said, ‘‘Mrs. Wilson was a covert employee of the CIA.’’ ‘‘Mrs. Wilson was under cover.’’

The CIA cleared these statements. I emphasize all of this because I know that there are people who are still trying to suggest

that what seems absolutely clear isn’t really true and that you

weren’t covert. And I think one of the things we need to do in this

hearing is make sure there isn’t any ambiguity on this point.

26

Just three more questions. Did you hold this covert status at the

time of the leak, did you? The covert status at the time of the leak?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, I did, Congressman. Yes.

Mr. CUMMINGS. No. 2, the Identities Protection Act refers to travel outside the United States within the last 5 years. Let me ask

you this question. Again, we don’t want classified information,

dates, locations or any other details. During the past 5 years, Ms.

Plame, from today, did you conduct secret missions overseas?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, I did, Congressman.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Finally, so as to be clear for the record, you were

a covert CIA employee and within the past 5 years from today, you

went on secret missions outside the United States; is that correct?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. That is correct, Congressman.

Mr. CUMMINGS. I want to thank you, and I hope this committee

now has cleared up the issue of covert, whether Ms. Plame was a

covert agent. And I yield back.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you very much Mr. Cummings. Mr.

Westmoreland.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I am glad

Mr. Cummings asked those questions because I was going to ask

them, too.

Mrs. Wilson, I want to thank you for your service to our country.

If I seem a little nervous, I have never questioned a spy before, and

so——

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I have never testified before.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. I’m sorry?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I have never testified under oath before.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. And I was here during the steroid hearings

too, and I don’t think any of those baseball stars got this kind of

media attention that you are getting today.

But when the chairman had his opening statements, he used

three different terms: covert, undercover and classified. Were you

one of those in particular? Or all of them? Or three different terms

to categorize, I guess, your service to the country?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. For those of us that were undercover in the

CIA, we tended to use covert or undercover interchangeably. I am

not—we typically would not say of ourselves we were in a classified

position. You are kind of undercover or covert employee.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. Now, did you just discuss this among yourself if you were classified or covert? Because I am assuming that

you couldn’t discuss it with anybody outside the Agency. So was it

kind of like y’all sat around the break room and said, I am covert

or I am classified? Or if I was going to tell somebody, what I would

tell somebody?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes. Within your colleagues, either within

the field or at headquarters here in Washington, if you were working on a project, sometimes you did need to know, are you under

cover or are you overt? Let me know. And then you know how to

treat them accordingly in the sense of how careful to be and your

association and so forth.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. Right. So your fellow CIA employees would

have known that you were covert or classified or whatever.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Oh, absolutely, absolutely.

27

Mr. WESTMORELAND. Did you ever tell anyone that you worked

for the CIA or was that commonly known that you worked for the

CIA or did you tell them that you were something else?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No, Congressman. I could count on one

hand the number of people who knew where my true employer was

the day that I was—my name was and true affiliation was exposed

in July 2003.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. OK. And I’m assuming one of those was

your husband.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. That’s—yes, he did know.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. Did he know if you were covert or classified

or——

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. He did understand. As a former Ambassador and having held security clearances and worked with many

Agency employees, he understood that world to a certain point, and

he certainly understood that I was undercover, and he protected

that diligently.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. OK. And this is the one last—are we going

to have another round of questions, Mr. Waxman, do you think?

Or——

Chairman WAXMAN. Well, we do have other panels. I guess if

Members wish them.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. I mean, I’m just trying——

Chairman WAXMAN. You have a minute and 48 seconds.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. OK. Ms. Plame, on October 5, 2003, being

interviewed on Meet the Press, your husband stated that my wife

will not allow herself to be photographed. In response to the picture you took for Vanity Fair, your husband was quoted in the

Washington Post, the picture should not be able to identify her and

are not supposed to. She is still employed by the CIA and has obligations to her employer. So I guess this was after the incident

where everybody knew that you worked for the CIA, that this was

done?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, Congressman. At the time that picture

came out, my covert status was long gone. And I will say this: Having lived most of my life very much under the radar, my learning

curve was steep, and it was more trouble than it was worth.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. But when the photograph was actually

taken in Vanity Fair, nobody that was not—that was not public

knowledge? I mean, all of this was not out then?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Oh, Congressman, the picture came out in

late 2003. My covert status was blown.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. OK. If your status was either covert or classified and if you did, in fact, meet with the Senate Democratic Policy Committee, Mr. Kristof, did you view as part of your covert or

classified work to meet with political groups and a columnist from

The New York Times to discuss matters within your purview at the

CIA? And, you know, I don’t know if you saw the list of things that

we could or could not ask you. Did this Democratic Policy Committee and the columnist from the New York Times have these same

rules that they could or could not ask you? Or did you volunteer

other information?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Congressman, I attended that conference

simply as a spouse of my husband, who was invited to speak. He

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had been invited to speak because he had quite a bit of experience

on Iraq, having served the first President Bush as the Charg

D’Affairs at our Embassy in Baghdad during the first Gulf war and

negotiated the release of the hostages with Saddam Hussein and

so forth. And he was asked to attend in that capacity. I had no discussions other than purely social in nature.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you, Mr. Westmoreland. Your time

has expired. Mr. Kucinich.

Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you very much, Mrs. Wilson, and thank

you for your service to our country. Briefly, I want to pick up on

my colleague Mr. Hodes’s question. When you look at this chart

and you see the extraordinary efforts that were made to disclose

your identity, and most of this information came out of the Libby

trial, what were you thinking when you saw the effort? This wasn’t

just a leak, was it, in your estimation—was this simply just a leak

of an ID?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Quite a bit of evidence came out in the

course of the Libby trial, and I really was deeply dismayed because

it just showed a recklessness and a political path that is very, very

unfortunate.

Mr. KUCINICH. In your judgment, when you look at the chart,

does it show a fairly organized approach to disclose your identity?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Well, it certainly is wide-reaching.

Mr. KUCINICH. Because, Mr. Chairman, you know, do leaks occur

of agents’ identities? It does happen?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I’m sorry, Congressman?

Mr. KUCINICH. Have there been in the past leaks of an agent’s

identity?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. None that I am aware of by their very own

government.

Mr. KUCINICH. And you have never in your experience as an

agent seen this kind of a coordinated effort by one’s own government, in this case our government, to disclose the identity of an

agent?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No, Congressman. I am not aware of any.

Mr. KUCINICH. To what extent does the agency go to to protect

the identities of its agents?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Significant effort. And, again, taxpayers’

money, particularly in this day and age of Google and Internet. The

efforts have to be even more vigilant and ever more creative, because it is extremely easy to find out a lot of information about

someone if you really want to. So we are constant—the CIA constantly needs to be one step ahead to protect their operations officers.

Mr. KUCINICH. So when there is an extraordinary effort made to

disclose the identity of an agent, it is destructive of the Agency and

it is destructive of the taxpayers’ investment in the Central Intelligence Agency; is that correct?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Absolutely.

Mr. KUCINICH. And one of the things that keeps running through

my mind is why, why did this happen to you? Was it an unintentional mistake or is it part of a larger pattern? In recent weeks

we’ve learned that U.S. attorneys in all parts of the country were

fired despite exemplary service, and several of these attorneys tesVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:42 Jan 22, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00032 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\38579.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
29

tified to Congress that they were being pressured to pursue cases

against Democratic officials. Others believe that they were fired because they were pursuing cases against Republican officials. Have

you followed this issue?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, I have, Congressman.

Mr. KUCINICH. And when I think of what’s happened to these attorneys, I can’t help but think of your case, because these could be

isolated instances, but they seem to be part of a larger pattern. Do

you know what happened, for example, with the former Treasury

Secretary, Mr. O’Neill, when he wrote his book The Price of Loyalty?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, I am aware of that.

Mr. KUCINICH. And then after Secretary O’Neill wrote that the

Bush administration was planning to overthrow Saddam Hussein

in a much earlier timeframe than anyone knew, Secretary O’Neill

was falsely accused of leaking classified information. Did you know

that Secretary O’Neill was investigated by the Treasury Department for a groundless accusation?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I believe I have read that. Yes, sir.

Mr. KUCINICH. Now another instance, General Shinseki warned

that the United States would need several hundred thousand

troops in Iraq. Ms. Wilson, do you remember what happened to

General Shinseki?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, I do, Congressman. He was dismissed.

Mr. KUCINICH. I will also remind you of the case of Richard Foster, the government’s chief Medicare actuary. He was actually told

he would be fired if he told Congress the truth about how much

the administration’s proposed drug benefit would cost. Were you

aware of that, Ms. Wilson?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, I was.

Mr. KUCINICH. Now, again, these could all be isolated instances,

but they seem to be part of a larger pattern. And I am struck by

what your husband, Joe Wilson, was quoted as saying in the book

Hubris.

Now according to the book, Joe Wilson was upset and said he regarded the leak as a warning to others. ‘‘Stories like this are not

intended to intimidate me, since I have already told my story. But

it is pretty clearly intended to intimidate others who might come

forward. You need only look at the stories of intelligence analysts

who say they’ve been pressured. They may have kids in college who

may be vulnerable to these types of smears.’’ Is this what you think

was going on here?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. When you look at—and I can speak only to

the realm of intelligence, and you have the politicizing of that. Certainly Vice President Cheney’s unprecedented number of visits to

CIA headquarters in the run-up to the war might be one example.

Mr. KUCINICH. That’s exactly the point. What happens when

someone is working at the Agency level that people are working at

when the Vice President visits, the Vice President of the United

States comes over and starts looking over their shoulder. Is that

intimidating?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, it is.

Chairman WAXMAN. Mr. Kucinich, your time has expired.

Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you very much.

30

Chairman WAXMAN. Ms. Watson.

Ms. WATSON. Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you for this hearing. It shows our determination to bring out into the open the malfeasance in office. I am an ambassador. I have gone through the

training. I have been blindfolded, put on a C–130, taken to a site,

taken into a room with my colleagues, just like Galactica 3,000,

handed a red folder ‘‘highly classified’’ with a general standing over

my shoulder, ‘‘Read it and give it back to me.’’ Any information

that came out of that folder and was made public had to come from

two sources, the general or myself. I was the only woman in the

room.

The men, if their wives asked them said, I could tell you but I

would have to kill you. So I am very sensitive to how it works. And

I am furious that your classified information was exposed. And

Robert Novak of all people.

Now, I am going to ask you some questions. They might appear

repetitive. But you are sworn, and I want this for the record. Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald found that at the time of Robert

Novak’s July 14, 2003 column, your employment status was classified and that your affiliation with the CIA was not common knowledge outside the Intelligence Community. The CIA has confirmed

to this committee that at the time of Mr. Novak’s article, your employment status was covert and that information was classified.

But some people are still trying to minimize your service by suggesting you really weren’t at risk and that your position was not

classified because you worked at a desk job at the CIA headquarters at Langley, Virginia.

Let me give you an actual example.

Representative Roy Blunt said on the television program Face

the Nation, you know, this was a job that the Ambassador’s wife

had that she went to every day. It was a desk job. I think many

people in Washington understood that her employment was at the

CIA and she went to that office every day.

Mrs. Wilson, is it fair to say that based on your service for our

government, you are well versed in the rules governing the handling of classified information?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Absolutely, Congresswoman. And I would

like to just add that when operations officers, when they are posted

in the field or back at headquarters, we are given training to understand—surveillance detection training so that we understand

very carefully that we are not being followed and that we feel very

comfortable that our status can be protected.

Ms. WATSON. That is the reason why I started off with my own

scenario.

Is it your understanding that the Executive order governing the

safeguarding of classified information prohibits the disclosure of

classified information to persons who are not authorized to receive

this information?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes. Correct.

Ms. WATSON. ‘‘Yes’’ is the answer?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, Congresswoman.

Ms. WATSON. And is it your understanding that when an employee at the CIA is undercover, that individual’s employment status at the CIA is considered classified information?

31

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, it is.

Ms. WATSON. Are you aware of any desk job exception to the

rules prohibiting the release of—release on information on the employment status of a CIA employee?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No, Congresswoman.

Ms. WATSON. So I think your testimony underscores the efforts

to minimize the significance of the disclosure of your employment

status or, in effect, minimizing the importance of the classified information, rules designed to protect our national security. And I am

infuriated to continue to hear, ‘‘She just had a desk job,’’ because

I understand, I have been there, I have had the training, and I

want to thank you sincerely for the work that you have done in regards to the protection of Homeland Security and showing the love

for this country.

Thank you very much.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Thank you, Congresswoman.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you, Ms. Watson.

Mr. Lynch.

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you. First of all, I want to thank you, Ms.

Plame, for coming before this committee and helping us with our

work, and for your service to our country. I have to say this hearing has been a long time in coming. The chairman and I and the

members of this committee have signed five or six requests over

the last 4 years to try to get you before us and to get to the bottom

of this.

What has happened to you needs to be taken in a wider context,

however. The two issues, two of the major issues here are, one, the

process by which Congress receives information relative to national

security. And as you know, your outing, if you will, or the disclosure of your covert status was, I think, a deliberate attempt to discount the statements of your husband with respect to the supposed

attempts by Saddam Hussein to purchase uranium or plutonium

through Niger. And, evidently from this chart, there were 20 occasions in which people deliberately, I think, attempted to destroy

your credibility and also to destroy your effectiveness within the organization, within the CIA.

And I know you have been very careful with your words. Once

or twice might be a careless disclosure. Five or six times might be

reckless, but 20 times—I will say it, 20 times is a deliberate attempt to destroy your status as a covert agent.

And the only other major case in which we have had the outing

of CIA agents, such as the Supreme Court in Haig v. Agee, said ‘‘It

is obvious and inarguable that no governmental interest is more

compelling than the security of the Nation.’’

And going to those couple of issues, first of all, the integrity of

the process by which we get our information was affected greatly,

I think, in the terms of other agents may have been very disheartened and troubled by what happened to you. And in an effort to

discount your husband’s credibility, the question was raised, and it

has been continually raised, of whether you were involved in the

decision by the CIA to actually send your husband, Ambassador Joseph Wilson, to Niger in February 2002 to obtain information on

the allegations that Iraq sought uranium from Niger—they sort of

said, ‘‘Oh, her. His wife sent him,’’ like my wife sends me out to

32

put out the trash, you know—tried to discount the import of that.

At least I admit it.

Now I want to ask you, the suggestion that you were involved

in sending your husband seemed to drive the leaks in an effort to

discount his credibility. I want to ask you now under oath, did you

make the decision to send Ambassador Wilson to Niger?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. No. I did not recommend him. I did not

suggest him. There was no nepotism involved. I didn’t have the authority. And, Congressman, if you will allow me briefly to just lay

out the sequence of events.

Mr. LYNCH. That was my next question, if you would. I sort of

doubted this. If I was going to send my wife somewhere, it wouldn’t

be Niger. But—nobody goes to Niger.

But, please, if you could lay out, walk us through everything you

did that may have been related around the time of the decision to

send Ambassador Wilson to Niger.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Thank you, Congressman. I am delighted

as well that I am under oath as I reply to you.

In February 2002, a young junior officer who worked for me came

to me very concerned, very upset. She had just received a telephone

call on her desk from someone, I don’t know who, in the Office of

the Vice President, asking about this report of this alleged sale of

yellow cake uranium from Niger to Iraq.

She came to me, and as she was telling me this, what had just

happened, someone passed by. Another officer heard this. He knew

that Joe had already—my husband had already gone on some CIA

missions previously to deal with other nuclear matters. And he

suggested well, why don’t we send Joe?

He knew that Joe had many years of experience on the African

continent. He also knew that he had served, and served well and

heroically, in the Baghdad Embassy, the Embassy in Baghdad during the first Gulf war.

And I will be honest, I was somewhat ambivalent. At the time,

we had 2-year-old twins at home, and all I could envision was me

by myself at bedtime with a couple of 2-year-olds. So I wasn’t—I

wasn’t overjoyed with this idea.

Nevertheless, we went to my branch chief, our supervisor. My

colleague suggested this idea, and my supervisor turned to me and

said, ‘‘Well, when you go home this evening, would you be willing

to speak to your husband, ask him to come in to headquarters next

week and we will discuss the options? See if this—what we could

do.’’ Of course. And as I was leaving, he asked me to draft a quick

e-mail to the chief of our Counterproliferation Division letting him

know that this was—might happen. I said, ‘‘Of course.’’

And it was that e-mail, Congressman, that was taken out of context, a portion of which you see in the Senate Select Committee on

Intelligence report of July 2004 that makes it seem as though I had

suggested or recommended him.

Mr. LYNCH. If I could followup because—just 30 seconds.

Chairman WAXMAN. Without objection.

Mr. LYNCH. And I want to go back to that Senate Intelligence

Committee hearing.

There were three Republican Senators who included a more definitive statement, it said, ‘‘The plan to send the former AmbasVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:42 Jan 22, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00036 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\38579.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
33

sador to Niger was suggested by the former Ambassador’s wife, a

CIA employee.’’

What is your reaction to that statement in the Senate report

about the genesis of your husband’s trip to Niger in 2002?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Congressman, it is incorrect. It has been

borne out in the testimony during the Libby trial. And I can tell

you that it just doesn’t square with the facts. Those additional

views were written exclusively by three Republican Senators.

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you, Mr. Lynch.

Mr. Yarmuth.

Mr. YARMUTH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am going to yield my

time to Mr. Van Hollen.

Chairman WAXMAN. Mr. Van Hollen is recognized for 5 minutes.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Thank you very much, Mr. Yarmuth and Mr.

Chairman.

Ms. Plame, thank you for your service to our country and your

testimony here today.

Just to remind us all of the larger context in which this happened and the lead-up to the war, we remember many statements

from the President of the United States, the Vice President of the

United States, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, others, about

mushroom clouds and invoking the image that Saddam Hussein

was going to be obtaining nuclear weapons and using them in terrorist attacks.

So when Ambassador Wilson wrote his article in the New York

Times that began with this statement, ‘‘Did the Bush administration manipulate intelligence about Saddam Hussein’s weapons program to justify invasion of Iraq,’’ and answered that question in the

following sentence, ‘‘Based on my experience with the administration, in the months leading up to the war, I have little choice but

to conclude some of the intelligence relating to Iraq’s nuclear intelligence program was twisted to exaggerate the Iraqi threat. That

posed a direct threat to the administration’s credibility.’’ And clearly they understood the danger of that because it undercut one of

the main underpinnings and justifications the administration gave

for the war.

And we see from the chart here that the White House did spring

into action and begin to try and discredit your husband, and that

is how you were drawn into this web.

Mr. McClellan, then-White House spokesman, said, ‘‘On behalf of

the administration, on behalf of the President, if any one in this

administration was involved in it,’’ meaning the leaks and the dissemination of information, ‘‘they would no longer be in this administration.’’

Do you believe there continue to be people, individuals in this administration, who were involved in leaking information about you?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, Congressman. As we know, again,

from the evidence that was introduced at the trial of the Vice

President’s former chief of staff, for one, Karl Rove clearly was involved in the leaking of my name, and he still carries a security

clearance to this date, despite the President’s words to the contrary

that he would immediately dismiss anyone who had anything to do

with this.

34

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. And the CIA spokesman made a statement,

and other intelligence officers have made the statements that we

have today, that the failure to hold people accountable for leaking

this kind of information sends a very terrible message to others in

the intelligence field.

Do you think the failure of the President to fire the people in his

administration who were involved with this message sends a

chilling message to those in the intelligence agencies, that the

White House is not willing to stand up behind those people who are

putting their lives at danger every day?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes. I believe it undermines the President’s

words.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Let me ask you this. And I would just say on

the record, with the statements that were made at trial with respect to Karl Rove’s involvement, I would just state the testimony

given by Mr. Cooper of Time Magazine, who said that he was told

by Karl Rove, ‘‘Don’t go too far out on Wilson.’’ That Mr. Wilson’s

wife worked at the, ‘‘Agency.’’ And at the conclusion of the conversation, according to Mr. Cooper, Mr. Rove said, ‘‘I have already

said too much.’’

Can you think of any reason that Mr. Rove would make that

statement if he did not know that he was engaged in wrongdoing?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Congressman, I cannot—I cannot begin to

speculate on Mr. Rove’s intent. I just know what his words were

and the effects.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Thank you.

Let me followup briefly on Mr. Lynch’s line of questioning regarding the Senate report and who really had Ambassador Wilson

sent to Niger and who was the instigator of that.

The unclassified Senate report asserts that the

Counterproliferation Division report officer told the committee staff

that the former Ambassador’s wife, you, offered up his name. Are

you familiar with that statement in the unclassified——

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, I am.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Now, we don’t want to reveal, and we don’t

want you to reveal any classified information or anyone’s identity,

but have you talked with that CPD reports officer who was interviewed by the Senate committee?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, Congressman. And I can tell you that

he came to me almost with tears in his eyes. He said his words had

been twisted and distorted. He wrote a memo, and he asked his supervisor to allow him to be reinterviewed by the committee. And

the memo went nowhere, and his request to be reinterviewed so

that the record could be set straight was denied.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Just so I understand, Mr. Chairman, if I could.

So there is a memo written by the CPD officer upon whose alleged testimony in the Senate report that contradicts the conclusions in that report.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Absolutely. Yes, sir.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, it seems to me that this committee should ask for that memo. It bears directly on the credibility

of the Senate report on this very, very important issue that they

have attempted to use to discredit Ambassador Wilson’s mission.

35

Chairman WAXMAN. I think the gentleman makes an excellent

point, and we will insist on getting that memo.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Thank you. Thank you for your testimony.

Chairman WAXMAN. Mr. Hodes, you are next.

Mr. HODES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I reserve my time. I yield

back.

Chairman WAXMAN. Mr. Sarbanes.

Mr. SARBANES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Ms. Wilson, thanks for being here today. I know this can’t be

easy for you.

If you put this affair in context, what has happened with you,

with all of the other abuses, frankly, Mr. Chairman, that we have

been investigating over the last 7 weeks—and I thank you for the

diligence of your inquiry and fairness of your inquiry into a number

of the things that have occurred—it paints a picture of an administration of bullies, in my view. The things that—in order to achieve

whatever the ends they are seeking, any means can be justified

and that people can just be pushed around.

We saw it when we had testimony of people in the White House

who bullied the scientific community by altering testimony on global warming. We have seen it in terms of the investigations you

have done, Mr. Chairman, with respect to the treatment of our

Civil Service. Now we see it in context of our Intelligence Community.

And to me what you have experienced is really the result of the

syndrome that has developed in this administration which reflects

the arrogance of power run amok.

I have just a couple of questions that I wanted to ask you in that

vein.

First of all, I gather you believe that the outing of your status,

the blowing of your covert status, was as a result of some of the

statements that your husband was making and the challenges that

he was bringing; is that right?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes. I believe that was one of the consequences.

Mr. SARBANES. OK. But at the point that they were prepared to

surrender your covert status to the public, I mean, what was to be

gained by that? I mean, can you—was it to apply further leverage?

I mean, really it was sort of after the fact at that point, right?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. My thinking, Congressman, is that by continuing to assert falsely that I somehow suggested him or recommended him for this mission, it would undercut the credibility

of what he was saying. And that is—that is what I think has happened. And it just got a little out of hand.

Mr. SARBANES. It strikes me as petulant behavior on their part.

Second, there is a suggestion being made that your status could

have been divulged sort of accidentally. But you have described efforts, structural efforts, that are designed to make sure that this

doesn’t happen accidentally. And so could you comment on that?

I mean, it seems to me that in order for your status to have been

disclosed, somebody had to want that to happen. In other words,

the way things were set up, it is highly unlikely that your status

would be disclosed by accident. It had to be as a result of an orchestrated effort that somebody wanted to put it out there.

36

Can you talk about sort of structurally, whether that is the case?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I can’t speak to intent, but I can speak to

simply what the actions that we can observe, and that, again, they

all knew that I worked in the CIA. They might not have known

what my status was. But that alone, the fact that I worked at the

CIA, should have put up a red flag that they acted in a much more

protective way of my identity and true employer.

Mr. SARBANES. And then last, again, I’m trying to get—because

this is more than—it’s more than a story about Valerie Plame Wilson and what happened to you, as devastating as it has been to

your life over these last period of months. It’s about our Intelligence Community. And you spoke yourself to how this kind of

conduct can affect the integrity and effectiveness of our intelligence

apparatus.

Can you comment on the chilling effect, if you will, on what the

message it sends to people, to those, for example, who would be

sent on a mission to collect intelligence about a subject that the

White House might already have a very strong opinion about. How

would it affect the way that agent, the way that person would

check that information and get that information back up the chain?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Intelligence collection is certainly more an

art than a science, but if there is any taint of bias, then it undermines its usefulness. The primary customer of our intelligence is,

of course, the President of the United States. And if the President

of the United States thinks somehow—or doesn’t believe that his

intelligence that he receives on his desk, he or she receives on his

desk every morning, is free of ideology, politics, a certain viewpoint,

how then can that President make the most important decisions of

all about the security of our country? I mean, that is—I do feel passionately about that. You have to get the politics out of our intelligence process.

Mr. SARBANES. I appreciate that. I appreciate the passion that

you brought to your job. And you represent hundreds of thousands

of people that go to work and try to make a difference for this country and I think are being bullied by this administration. You won’t

get the policy from them that you deserve. But I want you to know

that everyone here appreciates your service.

Thank you very much.

Chairman WAXMAN. We have gone back and forth, and, rather

than a second round, Mr. Davis and I have agreed that we will

have 5 minutes wrap-up on each side; 5 minutes will be controlled

by the chairman and the ranking member.

And I would yield 5 minutes to Mr. Davis at this point.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. I yield to Mr. Westmoreland such time

as he would consume.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, I hate it that we are not going to stay here to get

all of our questions answered by Ms. Wilson, because I have so

many to ask, because there is so many conflicting reports. And I

think that with something of this importance, that we should have

made a little more time for it.

But Ms. Wilson, the Counterproliferation Division of the CIA,

that seems like a pretty important place where a bunch of smart

37

people would work and keep good records. Would that—would I be

OK in thinking that?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, Congressman.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. But in the Senate Intel report that I have

that says some CPD officials could not recall how the Office decided

to contact the former Ambassador, was this a voluntary lack of

memory or were there no notes kept on it? Is it—how could they

forget how they came about a name that they were fixing to send

to a foreign country to check on the intelligence of Iraq getting material to build nuclear bombs? That seems a little bit far-fetched to

me.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Congressman, please remember that in this

period in the run-up to the war, we in the Counterproliferation Division of the CIA were working flat-out as hard as we could to try

to find good, solid intelligence for our senior policymakers on these

presumed programs.

My role in this was to go home that night without revealing any

classified information, of course, and ask my husband would he be

willing to come into CIA headquarters the following week and talk

to the people there. At that meeting, I introduced him and I left,

because I did have a hundred and one other things I needed to do.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. But what I’m trying to say is do you think

there would not have been a paper trail of how his name came

about, who would have—who would have mentioned it first or—I

mean, to me that is a pretty important assignment to give somebody; and, you know, maybe somebody would want to say ‘‘Hey,

that was my idea. That was my guy that I was sending over there,’’

and want to take credit for it. But it seems like everybody is running from it.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Congressman, I believe one of the pieces of

evidence that was introduced in the Libby trial was an INR memo

of that meeting where it states, in fact, my husband was not particularly looking forward to—he didn’t think it was necessary.

There had been, I believe, at least two other reports, one by a

three-star general and one by the Ambassador there on the ground

who said there wasn’t really much of this allegation. And the INR

folks that attended the meeting also said well, we are not sure that

this is really necessary.

But it was ultimately decided that he would go, use his contacts,

which were extensive in the government, to see if there was anything more to this. It was a serious question asked by the Office

of the Vice President and it deserved a serious answer.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. Are you familiar with a Charles Grimere

that was the former Iraq mission manager for the CIA?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I know of him, sir, yes.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. He testified in the Libby trial that all he

had heard is that you were working for this Counterproliferation

Division, and it could have been a number of things that different

people, I guess, look at this, some covert, some classified, some undercover, some different names.

Is that true that there are different classifications of people that

work at this Counterproliferation Division?

38

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. What I would say that’s most accurate is

most of the employees at the Counterproliferation Division are undercover of some sort.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. But he did work for the CIA so he should

have known that you were undercover or classified or——

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I am saying that the fact was that most

people in the Counterproliferation Division were undercover. I can’t

speak to what he should have or should have not known—were

probably cognizant of that, yes, sir.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. And you mentioned taking politics out of intelligence. And your husband—would you say he was a Democrat

or a Republican?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Although my husband comes from a Republican family with deep roots in California, I would say he is a Democrat now, Congressman.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. OK. And just to kind of keep score, not that

you would put yourself in any political category, would you say you

are a Democrat or a Republican?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Congressman, I am not sure that is——

Mr. WESTMORELAND. I know. But I gave a list of questions I

couldn’t ask you, and that wasn’t one of them, so I didn’t know if

you would be willing to——

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, Congressman. I am a Democrat.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. You are a Democrat.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, I am.

Mr. WESTMORELAND. So the Vice President, who is a Republican,

who evidently thought from his CIA briefing that he had gotten 1

day, felt like that this needed to be looked at further, the report

that Niger was selling this yellow cake uranium to Iraq, that he

would get some further intel on it. They called the

Counterproliferation—or at least somebody in the CIA—and then

we had a Democrat or at least supposedly someone who may be affiliated on the Democratic side—represent her, or present or supposedly present or at least vouch for her husband who was—who

had come from a good Republican family that had lost his way and

became a Democrat.

But my point is, in his piece titled, ‘‘What I Didn’t Find in Africa,’’ he disputes the Bush administration’s claims of there was no

evidence that Niger was selling it. But you, coming from an intelligence background, you don’t just depend on one report from one

country or one source to base all your intelligence on, do you?

Wouldn’t you gather it from a bunch of different sources and then

kind of put it together and look at it and not just one from——

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. That is correct, Congressman.

Chairman WAXMAN. The gentleman’s time has expired.

Do you have a last question that you want to ask?

Mr. WESTMORELAND. No.

I guess, Mr. Chairman, my last comment would be to you that

I still think it is a shame that—we have Ms. Wilson here and all

of the press came and all of these good people came to witness all

of this, and it’s been quite a spectacle—that we wouldn’t get to ask

all of the questions that we had.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. I think what is clear here is, first of all,

it is a terrible thing that any CIA operative would be outed. But

39

what is difficult, I think, what we haven’t been able to establish

is who knew who was undercover and who was in a covert status.

And I think we would have to look at that. But if there is no evidence here that the people that were outing this and pursuing this,

had knowledge of the covert status—And so I just wanted to make

that point.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Thank you, Congressman.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you, Mr. Davis.

I want to yield to Ms. Norton for 5 minutes.

Ms. NORTON. Thank you very much. And thank you, Ms. Wilson,

as others have thanked you for your extraordinary service to our

country.

I am trying to understand the effect of the Executive order, because there is an Executive order that is Executive Order 12958.

It is an Executive order, a Presidential Executive order, that indicates what authorized—what the requirements are to prevent unauthorized disclosures.

And in summary, they are background checks, official need to

know. I am particularly interested in the official need to know.

And I ask you to look at the middle chart, the middle part of the

chart on there where the White House and other officials, State Department officials, are listed.

Can you think of any reason that any of those officials would

have had a reason to know your identity, in particular, as a covert

agent?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Congresswoman, there was no need to

know my specific identity other than I was a CIA officer, according

to that chart. None whatsoever.

Ms. NORTON. Could I ask you whether there is any difference in

your review between disclosing the identity of a covert agent and

disclosing classified information, what if any difference would there

be?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I think damage in either case could be

equally devastating. It would simply depend on what the classified

information was. But certainly revealing an operative’s true identity is devastating. In my case, I was working on trying to find the

Iraq weapons of mass destruction programs and what they were up

to.

Ms. NORTON. I suppose we could all think of classified information involving our country that would have a devastating effect on

all of us.

Disclosing the name of a classified agent might have a devastating effect on more than that agent’s career; is that not the case?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Absolutely, Congresswoman.

The ripple effects go outward in quite wide circles. There are all

of the contacts through the years as either innocent or in a professional manner. The agents, the networks. Much is taken out.

Ms. NORTON. Are there circumstances under which disclosing the

identity of a covert agent could result in the death of that agent,

and hasn’t that occurred before in our country’s history?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, it has.

Ms. NORTON. If, in fact, an official of any kind did not have an

official reason to know your status, in your view would that be a

40

violation of the Executive order which lists official need to know as

a reason for having classified information?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, Congresswoman. I would think so.

Ms. NORTON. So you think it would be.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. It would be a violation.

Ms. NORTON. One of my colleagues questioned you regarding the

accusation that over and over again was repeated in the press, and,

for that matter, by a number of public officials, that it was you who

was responsible for your husband’s being selected to go on the controversial trip at issue.

As I understand it, that person has indeed said that he was not

the person who indicated that you had been responsible for the selection of your husband to go to Niger.

If that is the case, would you say that it would be inappropriate

for us or others to rely on the information that a CIA official had

said that you were responsible for the selection of your husband to

go to Niger?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. That is incorrect. A senior Agency officer

said she had nothing to do with his trip. And I would just like to

add that certainly I had no political agenda at the time of my husband’s trip. Joe had no political agenda. We were both looking to

serve our country.

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, I understand that the CIA official

to which I refer has in fact said that in writing, and I ask that you

try to get the memorandum of that official that would make it clear

that he or she was not responsible for this information.

Chairman WAXMAN. We will try to get that information and hold

it for the record.

Ms. NORTON. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman WAXMAN. Mr. Davis.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Let me clarify one thing. You noted that

when you learned about this, your husband picked up the paper

and said, ‘‘He did it.’’ Do you remember your testimony today? ‘‘He

did it.’’ Was he referring to Novak? Was he referring to the administration? And did you know this was percolating?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Yes, sir. He was referring to Mr. Novak. We

had indications in the week prior that Mr. Novak knew my identity

and my true employer. And I, of course, alerted my superiors at the

Agency, and I was told don’t worry, we will take care of it. And it

was much to our surprise that we read about this July 14th.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Do you know if your superiors at the

Agency did anything at that point to stop the outing of a CIA

agent? It would seem to me they would have picked up the phone

to say this is a serious matter, this is a crime. Do you have any

idea?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Absolutely. This is what I believe and this

is what I read, that then-spokesman Mr. Harlow spoke directly to

Mr. Novak and said something along the lines of, ‘‘Don’t go with

this. Don’t do this.’’ I don’t know exactly what he said. But he

clearly communicated the message that Mr. Novak should not publish my name.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. And you don’t know if he said this could

be a violation of law, she is a covert operator or anything like that.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. I have no idea.

41

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. One of the long-term concerns outside of

the—I mean, the outing of an agent is very serious business which

I think has been underscored by both sides. But if no one knows

that you’re covert, it’s hard at that point to show any violation of

law and the like. But if you have notice, that’s a different issue.

And so you did the appropriate thing in notifying your superiors

that this was percolating, and they were not able to stop it. Is that

your testimony?

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. That is correct.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Thank you.

Chairman WAXMAN. Mrs. Wilson, you can be a Democrat, you

can be a Republican. No one asks our servicemen or CIA operatives

what they believe in in terms of their politics to go out and serve

their country. They are not acting as Democrats or Republicans.

They and you were acting as Americans.

Facts are not Republican or Democratic. Your husband revealed

the falsehood of the reason the President gave to go to war against

Saddam Hussein in Iraq. And the reason he gave, even in his State

of the Union address, was that the weapon of mass destruction

that Saddam Hussein had, or would soon have, is a nuclear bomb.

That was very sobering, but it was false.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Uh-huh.

Chairman WAXMAN. And when your husband wrote the article,

that went right to the heart of this claim.

So one could see why they wouldn’t like what your husband

wrote. But they made you collateral damage. Your career was

ended. Your life may have been in jeopardy. And they didn’t seem

to care, even to this point, because you said they haven’t even

called to apologize.

Now, whether they knew it and intentionally gave out this information about your status is the reason for this investigation. If

they knew it then, that you were a covert undercover agent, and

they disclosed that fact, that is a big deal. That is a serious jeopardizing of our national security.

If they didn’t know you were an undercover covert agent, then

I have to wonder in my mind what was their thinking. That this

guy couldn’t be right because his wife had something to do with the

mission? Boy, is that sort of silly.

Either way, I don’t think it speaks well for all of those people in

the White House to have gone out of their way to let the press

know this information which was the only, I guess, the only thing

they had to say.

The President has finally acknowledged the statement that your

husband pointed out was factually incorrect. The President has acknowledged it was factually incorrect. The Secretary of State said

the CIA didn’t tell her, but it turned out that her chief deputy did

get informed, Mr. Hadley, that the statement was not correct; that

they were putting it into the State of the Union address, the most

vetted speech a President ever makes. They acknowledged the validity of your husband’s statement. And what do we have for you?

Well, just collateral damage.

I find that troubling that in the zeal for their political positioning, that there are a lot of collateral damage around, including a

war that didn’t have to be fought.

42

I want to thank you very much for your presence here. I think

it has been helpful, and we are going to continue this investigation.

Ms. WATSON. A question to the Chair.

Chairman WAXMAN. Yes.

Ms. WATSON. The first, I think, most of us knew about Valerie

Plame as being an undercover agent was through Robert Novak’s

July 14, 2003 column. Is it possible, as we continue our oversight

function, to have Mr. Novak under oath come in and testify to the

fact that he did print that information?

Chairman WAXMAN. Well, I think we know that he did print that

information and that we know now she was a covert agent. I have

many—I will give it some thought. But I want to underscore that

we need an investigation. This is not about Scooter Libby, and it’s

not just about Valerie Plame Wilson. It is about the integrity of our

national security and whether it is being jeopardized.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. I think if you do that, we—you need to

involve the CIA, because there is no evidence here that anyone out

there had any idea that she was an undercover agent, that she was

a covert agent at this point.

Chairman WAXMAN. You may well be right. But the CIA did.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. And, in fact, she did the appropriate

thing in going to her superiors when she found out that she was

about to be outed.

I would have thought at that point, if the CIA felt one of their

operatives were going to be outed, they would have gone to great

lengths to try to kill the story and let them know what the law

was.

Chairman WAXMAN. That is a very good point, and I think we

need to get——

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. In the President’s speech—and I have to

say this—in the President’s speech when he mentioned the uranium, those words were cleared by the CIA. It may not have been

in accordance with what Mr. Wilson found, but Ms. Plame’s boss

approved that. And I think the record should reflect that.

Chairman WAXMAN. Before I call on anybody else.

Yes, Mr. Hodes.

Mr. HODES. Just very briefly. The suggestion about what we

don’t know cannot be finally determined until we pursue the investigation that we need to pursue and find out what the people on

this chart knew and when they knew it, who the unknown person

or persons are, and we need an investigation.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. We had a special prosecutor who did

this, Mr. Hodes. The special prosecutor looked at this and spent 2

years on this.

Chairman WAXMAN. This is a hearing to get information from

witnesses, not to debate, although it is inevitable. But let us, I

think, move on with our hearing.

I thank all of the Members for their participation. I wish we had

all of the Members here to participate, but all of those Members

were invited and had adequate notice, but this is a Friday.

Thank you so much for being here.

Mrs. PLAME WILSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

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Chairman WAXMAN. We are going to recess for 4 or 5 minutes

just so we can settle down and get the next witnesses up and take

care of whatever pressing matters that need to be attended to.

[Recess.]

Chairman WAXMAN. The committee will come back to order.

I am pleased to welcome our next two witnesses. Dr. James

Knodell is the security officer for the Executive Office of the President. According to GAO, this position is, ‘‘responsible for formulating and directing the execution of security policy, reviewing and

evaluating Executive Office of the President security programs, and

conducting security indoctrinations and debriefings for agencies of

the Executive Office of the President.’’

Mr. Bill Leonard is the Director of the Information Security

Oversight Office at the National Archives and Records Administration. This office is charged with developing security classification

policies for classifying, declassifying, and safeguarding security information generated in government and industry, and evaluating

the effectiveness of the security classification programs developed

by government and industry.

And I want to welcome both of you to our hearing today.

Your prepared statements are going to be in the record in its entirety, and we are going to ask you to keep your oral presentation

to around 5 minutes or try to keep it under 5 minutes.

It is the practice of this committee to swear in all witnesses, so

if you will please rise.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Chairman WAXMAN. The record will indicate that the witnesses

answered in the affirmative.

Mr. Knodell, why don’t we start with you?

STATEMENTS OF JAMES KNODELL, DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF SECURITY, EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT, THE

WHITE HOUSE; AND WILLIAM LEONARD, DIRECTOR, INFORMATION SECURITY OVERSIGHT OFFICE, NATIONAL ARCHIVES AND RECORDS ADMINISTRATION

STATEMENT OF JAMES KNODELL

Mr. KNODELL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

My name is James Knodell. I am the Chief Security Officer for

the Office of Security and Emergency Preparedness, Office of Administration, Executive Office of the President.

The Office of Security and Emergency Preparedness is commonly

referred to as OSEP, which provides personnel security and physical security and emergency preparedness for the Executive Office

of the President and Office of the Vice President.

OSEP works closely with the U.S. Secret Service, National Security Council, and the White House Military Office as well as EOP

managers and all personnel assigned to the EOP to ensure their security measures are well coordinated and that required controls are

consistently and fully implemented.

OSEP provides a variety of services that ensure the proper protection of EOP resources including information, people, and facilities. These services include prescreening candidates for employment based on security guidelines, monitoring the background inVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:42 Jan 22, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00047 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\38579.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
44

vestigation process, briefing employees on requirements and guidelines for the handling and storage of classified material.

In reference to the committee’s request that I provide information on White House procedures for safeguarding classified information, OSEP follows guidelines set forth in various Executive orders that deal with classified information.

For example, Executive Order 12968, Access to Classified Information, dated August 2, 1985, established a uniform Federal personnel security program for employees who will be considered for

initial or continued access to classified information.

Executive Order 12958, Classified National Security Information,

dated April 17, 1995, prescribes a uniform system for classifying,

safeguarding, and declassifying national security information.

OSEP staff members brief all new EOP employees on the responsibilities for handling and securing classified information consistent

with these Executive orders. Additionally, mandatory annual refresher security briefings are provided to those EOP employees

holding security clearances. In the event that an EOP employee

fails to follow applicable guidelines resulting in a security violation,

a member of the EOP office to which the individual’s assigned

should report the matter to OSEP.

OSEP then refers the matter and it follows procedures consistent

with the guidelines in Executive Order 12968 to ensure that a determination is made to whether the person should continue to hold

a security clearance and if the incident involves a risk to classified

information controlled by an organization outside the EOP, that organization is notified.

Mr. Chairman, I am not able to discuss individual cases or investigations. I would be happy to answer questions related to the procedures for handling classified information or corresponding to the

unauthorized release of classified information.

Thank you.

Chairman WAXMAN. Mr. Leonard.

STATEMENT OF J. WILLIAM LEONARD

Mr. LEONARD. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman Waxman, Mr. Davis, and members of the committee,

I wish to thank you for inviting me to testify here today.

I direct the Information Security Oversight Office [ISOO]. Under

Executive Order 12958, as amended, we have substantial responsibilities with respect to the classification, safeguarding, and declassification of information by agencies within the executive

branch. Included is the responsibility to develop and promulgate a

directive implementing the order.

It is the order that sets forth the basic framework and legal authority by which executive branch agencies may classify national

security information. Pursuant to his constitutional authority and

through the order, the President has authorized a limited number

of officials to apply classification to certain national security-related information.

In delegating classification authority, the President has established clear parameters for its use and certain burdens that must

be satisfied.

45

Specifically, every act of classifying information must be traceable back to its origin as an explicit decision by a responsible official who has been expressly delegated original classification authority. In addition, the original classification authority must be able

to identify or describe the damage to national security that could

reasonably be expected if the information was subject to unauthorized disclosure. Furthermore, the information must be owned by,

produced by or for, or under the control of the U.S. Government.

And, finally, it must fall into one or more of the categories of information specifically provided for in the order.

The President has also spelled out in the order some very clear

prohibitions and limitations with respect to the use of classification. Specifically, for example, in no case can information be classified in order to conceal violations of law, inefficiency, or administrative error.

It is the responsibility of officials delegated original classification

authority to establish at the time of the original decision the level

of classification as well as the duration of classification.

The order and directive go on to establish requirements for access to classified information, such as the need for a favorable access eligibility determination by an agency, as well as the execution

of an approved nondisclosure agreement.

The order and directive also promulgates minimum standards for

the safeguarding of classified information, including such issues as

storage, reproduction, transmission and destruction.

We also establish actions to be taken in the event of a loss, possible compromise, or unauthorized disclosure of classified information. This includes the prompt reporting and investigation of such

instances in order to implement appropriate corrective actions and

to ascertain the degree of damage to national security.

While I stated earlier it is the responsibility of the original classification authority to determine the duration of classification, a fundamental principle of the order is that classified information shall

be declassified as soon as it no longer meets the standards for classification.

In addition, while the order presumes that information that continues to meet the standards for classification requires continued

protection, it provides for exceptional cases in which the need to

protect such information may be outweighed by the public’s interest in disclosure of the information.

In such circumstances, an agency head or designated official

may, as an exercise of discretion, declassify the information.

In addition to the above, information can be declassified in one

of three ways: first, by implementing the instructions set forth in

a classification or declassification guide; second, by following a view

by an authorized official, or third, automatically, without benefit of

review.

Finally, the order establishes specific responsibility for agencies

in establishing an effective classification management program.

Again, I want to thank you for inviting me here today, Mr.

Chairman. I would be happy to answer your questions and any

questions any members the committee might have.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you very much.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Leonard follows:]

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48

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Chairman WAXMAN. The Chair will recognize himself to start off

the questions.

Mr. Knodell, you are the one charged at the White House for

safeguarding classified information; isn’t that correct?

Mr. KNODELL. That is correct.

Chairman WAXMAN. And in doing so, you have an Executive

Order 12958 that implements the regulations for the protection of

this information. I want to ask you about that and, of course, we

are looking at the context of Mrs. Wilson’s identity being disclosed.

Federal regulations require that any person who has knowledge

of the loss or compromise of classified information has an obligation

to report to the White House Security Officer.

I want to read to you 5CFS section 1212.30. ‘‘Any White House

employee who has knowledge of the loss or possible compromise of

classified information should report the circumstances to the EOP

security officer.’’ Is that accurate, Mr. Knodell?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, it is.

Chairman WAXMAN. And the White House officials who know

about the disclosure of classified information have an obligation to

report what they know to you.

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, sir.

Chairman WAXMAN. Mr. Leonard, you are one of the Nation’s experts on protection of classified information. Do Federal officials

who learn of the possible breach of classified information have an

obligation to report it to the security officer at the White House?

Mr. LEONARD. Any individual that becomes aware of a security

violation, especially one in which may involve an unauthorized disclosure, has the obligation to promptly report that matter to the

designated official to receive that.

Chairman WAXMAN. That’s whether it was intentionally disclosed

or unintentionally disclosed?

Mr. LEONARD. Yes, sir, that’s correct.

Chairman WAXMAN. Mr. Knodell, I want to ask you about whether the White House officials complied with this requirement after

the disclosure of Mrs. Wilson’s identity. Let me start with the

former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer, Mr. Fleischer’s

conversations with Walter Pincus of the Washington Post and

David Gregory of NBC News about Ms. Wilson’s identity. These

conversations took place in July 2003. Almost immediately it was

clear that Ms. Wilson’s identity was classified information.

Mr. Knodell, the regulations require Mr. Fleischer to report what

he knew about this disclosure to you. Did he do that?

Mr. KNODELL. Mr. Chairman, I thought the agreement here for

me today was I would not discuss specific investigations.

Chairman WAXMAN. As I understood it, we wouldn’t discuss the

Libby case. That was a concern, that we were going to rehash the

Libby case. This is the Valerie Plame Wilson case, and it is a question Congress is exploring to fine out whether our security laws

and regulations are working.

One way to find that out is to find out whether you were told

that there was a violation and the rules were upheld and followed

in the requirement and obligations to report it to you.

Mr. KNODELL. Mr. Chairman, that happened before my tenure in

this current position. I began this position in August 2004.

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Chairman WAXMAN. Well, do you—are you aware of whether the

report was made by Mr. Fleischer to your predecessor?

Mr. KNODELL. I’m not, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman WAXMAN. Are you aware if there’s any investigation

that ever took place in the White House about the release of this

classified information?

Mr. KNODELL. I am not.

Chairman WAXMAN. Do you know whether Carl Rove, the President’s senior political adviser, came forward and reported what he

knew about the breach of Ms. Wilson’s identity. After all, we

learned that Mr. Rove talked about her identity with at least two

journalists, a Robert Novak and Matthew Cooper of Time Magazine.

Mr. KNODELL. Mr. Chairman, I have no knowledge of any investigation within my office.

Chairman WAXMAN. How long have you been in this office?

Mr. KNODELL. Since August 2004.

Chairman WAXMAN. Two and a half years. Were you aware in

the last 21⁄2 years that this was an issue for which there was a lot

of concern?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, Mr. Chairman, I was.

Chairman WAXMAN. Did you learn that from people in the White

House?

Mr. KNODELL. Through the press.

Chairman WAXMAN. Mr. Leonard, the regulations seem clear, it

says that officials like Mr. Rove have an obligation to report security violations.

Mr. Knodell, wouldn’t there have to be a report that would have

been filed in your office?

Mr. KNODELL. If we were notified, there would be, sir, yes.

Chairman WAXMAN. So if you were notified, a report would be on

file. Is that right?

Mr. KNODELL. Correct.

Chairman WAXMAN. You don’t know if there’s one on file. Is that

correct, you don’t even know there’s one on file?

Mr. KNODELL. There is not one on file.

Chairman WAXMAN. There is not one on file. You know that

there is no report on file that classified information was disclosed

and that report was about Fleischer or Rove or all the other names.

Mr. KNODELL. Mr. Chairman, not within the Office of Security

and Emergency Preparedness.

Chairman WAXMAN. Mr. Leonard, just to clarify the point, isn’t

there an obligation under the law to have that information filed by

the person who learns that he disclosed classified information even

inadvertently?

Mr. LEONARD. Again, Mr. Chairman, the requirement is for anyone who becomes aware of a violation, the person who may be involved in committing it or someone who is otherwise aware of it,

to promptly report that to the designated official so that an appropriate inquiry and investigation can be conducted.

Chairman WAXMAN. Well, these people may not have known at

the time they disclosed this information to the press but they certainly learned afterwards. Did they have an obligation even then

to report?

51

Mr. LEONARD. Yes, Mr. Chairman. Again, the purpose of the notification is to allow for the conduct of an investigation or an inquiry

in order to at the very least determine what the causes were so as

to provide for corrective action to assess the possibility of damage

to national security.

Chairman WAXMAN. Last question to Mr. Knodell. Was there any

corrective action taken, was any disciplinary action taken against

Mr. Rove for failing to report his knowledge of the breach of Mrs.

Wilson’s identity?

Mr. KNODELL. No, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman WAXMAN. No, no action was taken, or no, you don’t

know?

Mr. KNODELL. No action was taken.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you. Mr. Davis.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Mr. Knodell, you just found out you were

coming here yesterday, is that correct?

Mr. KNODELL. Actually had word of it earlier in the week but

found out definitively yesterday, yes, sir.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Generally committee rules about advance

notice and consultation to protect both the majority and minority

rights, we get notice of these, and requires that Members be informed in writing of witnesses and the likely scope of their testimony 3 days prior to a hearing.

We were informed only yesterday of the addition of two witnesses

to today’s, which doesn’t generally allow us the time to prepare

that we would ordinarily like.

Do you know, was the possibility of a subpoena discussed with

you or with Mr. Fielding in terms of your coming here today?

Mr. KNODELL. I understand that there was talk of a subpoena.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Just for the record, the minority was not

consulted on that at all.

Chairman WAXMAN. Would the gentleman yield? As I understand

it, Mr. Knodell was expected to come here and that information

was out there a week prior to today and it was shared with the minority staff. We found out yesterday that Mr. Knodell was not

going to be permitted to testify. I called the White House Counsel

and suggested that we might have to issue a subpoena unless Mr.

Knodell was made available. I was told the subpoena would not be

necessary. Mr. Knodell is here.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. My understanding was that the invitation had come but we weren’t notified until yesterday he would appear.

Let me just start. When an agency creates classified material,

let’s say the CIA, and then shares it with another agency, what obligations and responsibilities does the originator have to convey the

classification status to the recipient?

Mr. KNODELL. If it’s a document, it will be clearly marked on

that document.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. How about an individual?

Mr. KNODELL. They should be told that it’s classified material

that’s being passed.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. To your knowledge there was no knowledge at the White House of Mrs. Plame’s covert status. Or can you

not comment on that?

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Mr. KNODELL. I can’t comment, I don’t have any knowledge of it.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Mr. Leonard, let me just ask this, does

the burden generally fall on the agency that has the classification

or that would have an employee in a covert status to convey that?

How else would another agency know?

Mr. LEONARD. With respect to conveying classification status, the

burden or the responsibility—clearly the preferred way is immediate notice to the recipient of classified information. That can happen either by markings on a document if it’s written notification,

or if it’s oral notification, it would be something along——

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. In this case there were briefings; there

were briefings from individuals and names on briefings but there

would not be any documentation, would there, to say this person

is covert or not covert, as a general rule?

Mr. LEONARD. When disclosure is oral, normally it would be preceded by something along the lines what I’m about to tell you is

classified such and such a level. Another way to disclose or the provide classification guidance is to again have a written classification

that have would provide specifics as to what’s classified at what

level or to convey the substance of a classification guide through

the course of briefings and whatever. And then last, all cleared individuals have an affirmative responsibility by virtue of signing a

nondisclosure agreement that if there is any question in their mind

as to the true classification of status of information they are provided, they are obligated to seek clarification before the disclosure.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Is there an obligation to ask?

Mr. LEONARD. If there was uncertainty in the mind of the recipient by virtue of the nondisclosure agreement.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. The difficulty we have in this situation

is there are a lot of people that work for CIA and are not under

cover or in a covert operation. In fact, they fill it out on applications publicly. Everybody knows they work there.

I’m just wondering what is the obligation of a recipient agency

at that point to ask appropriate questions, or should the obligation

be on the CIA affirmatively to protect their employees. That’s really the question here. Because we have heard no testimony in the

first panel that there was any knowledge on the part of anybody

who was passing this information that Mrs. Plame was in a covert

status. Had there been, I think we would have seen the investigation turn out differently at this point.

Mr. LEONARD. There is an affirmative obligation on the part of

the party who’s disclosing the information. If there is uncertainty

in the mind of the recipient, there is likewise an affirmative responsibility.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Let me ask you both this, this was a situation it’s clear Mrs. Plame appeared to have handled this appropriately, but if a newspaper is getting ready to out an operative or

a top secret memo or something and there are penalties attached,

what do you do at that point to let them know they are violating

the law, to let them know that they are going out with top secret

information or in this case outing an agent? What would be the obligation at that point of the CIA to go forward and notify the individuals that are suspected of outing or on the verge of doing this

that are exploring this?

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Mr. KNODELL. I think clearly if they know the classified information is going to be released it’s incumbent upon them——

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. How would they do it; say don’t do this?

Because when you say don’t do this to the press——

Mr. KNODELL. Because they have the classified information, they

can have them sign a nondisclosure agreement barring them

from——

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Would it be appropriate to say this is

classified information, will hurt national security? They should do

that, shouldn’t they?

Mr. LEONARD. They do.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. We don’t know what the facts were in

this, but I hope to work with Mr. Waxman to get the facts in this

particular case.

Mr. Leonard, would you agree with that?

Mr. LEONARD. It’s a judgment call, Mr. Davis. There certainly

will be circumstances where it is prudent to intercede along those

lines. There will be other circumstances where it may not be because they could serve to confirm something that we don’t want to

confirm, and quite frankly, just because something is in the media

doesn’t mean it’s accurate.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. But if you’re the CIA or with an agency

that has that and you know they have the information and they

are going to come out with it, at that point that argument goes out

the window.

Mr. LEONARD. Again, it depends upon what the nature.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. If it’s true.

Mr. LEONARD. Right. It depends on what the nature of the information. Your example of the identity of a covert officer, that would

be prudent.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. I think one of the issues here, aside from

all the political sideshow, is the fact that once the agency knew one

of their operatives, covert operatives were going to be outed, what

steps did they take at that point they knew a story was pending.

Mrs. Plame has testified here under oath that they knew this story

was coming, in fact her husband said he did it. Obviously there

were some conversations. And exactly what did the CIA do to protect their operative? At that point the obligation doesn’t go to the

White House who we weren’t even sure was in that particular

chain with the outing of that story, but what do they or should

they have done? I hope that we can explore that further.

Thank you.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you, Mr. Davis.

Mr. Cummings.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I want to

thank the gentlemen for testifying.

Mr. Knodell, let me—is it Knodell?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Let me ask you a few questions because in answering some of the chairman’s questions you left me shocked. I

want to make sure I heard you right.

Are you saying with regard to this case; that is, the outing of

Valerie Plame Wilson, there is no report?

Mr. KNODELL. Not in my office, there is not.

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Mr. CUMMINGS. Are you also saying that there was no investigation?

Mr. KNODELL. Not by my office.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Not by your office. And so I could conclude then

that there were no sanctions, is that correct? No sanctions within

your office?

Is it one of your jobs, part of your job to recommend sanctions

where you find that there has been a breach?

Mr. KNODELL. Correct. But there was already an outside investigation that was taking place, criminal investigation. That’s why

we took no action.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Now one of your main objectives for being in the

White House is to make sure that you—make sure that these kinds

of things don’t happen, is that right?

Mr. KNODELL. Correct.

Mr. CUMMINGS. I would assume if anyone took the job you took,

that one of—and considering what happened before you got there,

that this would be something that would be on the minds of everybody because, again, this is like bells ringing, alarms going off.

This is the kind of thing that you don’t want to do because this

could end up in your lap. Is that right?

Mr. KNODELL. In this particular case you’re absolutely right.

This started long before my tenure in this position. By the time I

took the position, the criminal investigation was already under

way.

Mr. CUMMINGS. But did you look into it at all, just so that you

could make sure you did your job right and didn’t allow this to happen again?

Mr. KNODELL. We didn’t want to have collateral investigations

going on at the same time, sir.

Mr. CUMMINGS. So if there is a criminal investigation and you

have—and you’re trying to make sure it doesn’t happen again, so

you don’t even look into it at all. In other words, you are the guy

who is responsible for guarding all this and making sure that everything goes right. So it sounds to me like we had a breach on top

of a breach. We had one situation where Mrs. Valerie Plame Wilson’s identity and covert status was disclosed and then within the

very office within the White House there is no report, there is no

investigation, and there are no sanctions?

Mr. KNODELL. Sir, again, any reporting would have taken place

prior to my arriving into the office.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Now——

Chairman WAXMAN. Will the gentleman yield because I just want

to pin this point down.

Do you know whether there was an investigation at the White

House after the leaks came out?

Mr. KNODELL. I don’t have any knowledge of an investigation

within my office.

Chairman WAXMAN. Ever.

Mr. KNODELL. I do not.

Chairman WAXMAN. Because the President said he was investigating this matter, was going to get to the bottom of it. You’re not

aware that any investigation took place?

Mr. KNODELL. Not within my office.

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Chairman WAXMAN. If there was an investigation, what were you

referring to, Mr. Fitzgerald’s investigation?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, the outside investigation.

Chairman WAXMAN. That didn’t start until months and months

later and that had the purpose of only narrowly looking to see

whether there was a criminal law violated. But there was an obligation for the White House to investigate whether classified information was being leaked inappropriately, wasn’t there?

Mr. KNODELL. If that was the case, yes.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Could I ask for one very quick question?

Mr. CUMMINGS. I yield.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Would the initiative of a criminal investigation relieve those who made these disclosures of the obligation

to report to you that by forcing them to disclose could violate their

fifth amendment rights?

Mr. LEONARD. Actually, in regards to security violations we encourage self-reporting. We would encourage them to contact our office.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Reclaiming my time, if Mr. Rove, for example,

the No. 1 adviser to the President of the United States, received

this information or had anything to do with the disclosing of a covert agent’s identity and now we have a situation where it appears

that the criminal trial is over, would your agency have anything,

I mean your office have anything to do now or do you just close the

books and say it’s over?

Mr. KNODELL. I have no indication from the Department of Justice or any other agency.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Would Mr. Rove have had a duty to report any

kind of breach?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Even today.

Mr. KNODELL. At the time of the occurrence.

Mr. CUMMINGS. I’m sorry?

Mr. KNODELL. At the time of the occurrence, when the violation

took place.

Mr. CUMMINGS. All right. Thank you.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you. Before I recognize the next witness I want to clarify this point, that the investigation by Mr. Fitzgerald didn’t take place for months and months and months after

it was well known that there had been a leak of the identity of a

covert CIA agent.

Now as I understand it, there was an obligation for the White

House to conduct an immediate investigation to find out whether

they needed to suspend security clearances of somebody who had

leaked this information, to maybe take disciplinary action against

an individual who might have been involved; third, to find out who

divulged it.

The White House had that obligation because this was a matter

of important, highest order national security.

Am I stating things correctly, Mr. Leonard?

Mr. LEONARD. Mr. Chairman, as you point out, whenever there

is suspected an unauthorized disclosure or compromise, there is an

affirmative responsibility to do an inquiry at the very least to imVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:42 Jan 22, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00059 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\38579.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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plement corrective actions so that subsequently additional and

similar violations do not continue to occur and also to be able to

ensure that any potential damage to national security is assessed.

Part of the assessment of corrective action is also the assessment

of the need for sanctions.

Chairman WAXMAN. Right after the Novak column appeared

there was an outrage that this was disclosing a covert agent. Not

only that, the CIA was so angered by it that they wrote a letter

to the Justice Department demanding an investigation. And in

light of this, which took place immediately after the information

that the leak was disclosed, the White House still has not initiated

an investigation.

Am I correct in that statement, Mr. Knodell?

Mr. KNODELL. That’s correct, my office has not.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you. Ms. Watson.

Ms. WATSON. Thank you.

Mr. Knodell, are you the Director of the Office of Security?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, ma’am.

Ms. WATSON. Executive Office of the President?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, ma’am.

Ms. WATSON. The White House.

Mr. KNODELL. I work for the Office of Administration, but, yes.

Ms. WATSON. How long have you been on the job?

Mr. KNODELL. I started this position in August 2004.

Ms. WATSON. 2004, and this is March 2007. I just want to establish that for the record.

The investigation that was led by Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald revealed that a number of White House officials, including

former Chief of Staff of the Vice President, Lewis Scooter Libby,

Senior Adviser to the President, Carl Rove, and the White House

Press Secretary Ari Fleischer, discussed and disclosed information

concerning Ms. Wilson’s CIA employment status.

With respect to some of these officials, the Fitzgerald proceedings, and how they attained the information was discussed and Mr.

Libby, for example, received information about Ms. Plame’s CIA

employment from the State Department, the Central Intelligence

Agency, the Vice President, and another aide to the Vice President.

What is not publicly known, however, is how Mr. Carl Rove learned

of Ms. Wilson’s employment status.

So, Mr. Knodell, under the requirements governing classified information, the White House should have conducted an investigation. Would that be you?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, ma’am, it would be my office.

Ms. WATSON. Of the breach regarding Ms. Wilson’s CIA employment status, can you tell us how Mr. Rove learned about Ms. Wilson’s employment status at the CIA?

Mr. KNODELL. I cannot.

Ms. WATSON. You have been on since when?

Mr. KNODELL. August 2004.

Ms. WATSON. And you cannot tell us if you investigated how that

information was leaked. Loudly for the record, please.

Mr. KNODELL. There was no investigation from the Office of Security and Emergency Preparedness, that’s correct.

57

Ms. WATSON. Isn’t that unusual? That’s why I wanted you to establish your position. You are the Director of the Office of Security

and you did no investigation of how this information was out there?

Mr. KNODELL. That’s correct.

Ms. WATSON. OK. Has there been any investigation by your office

into how Mr. Rove would have obtained the information? Apparently your answer is no.

Mr. KNODELL. That’s correct.

Ms. WATSON. It seems to me that there is some dereliction of

duty if you are the Director and you are to oversee the security

from the White House and you’re telling me there was no investigation.

Mr. KNODELL. That’s correct.

Ms. WATSON. Mr. Chairman, I think we ought to further investigate why the Director’s office, whether it was the person who preceded him and now he falls into this and he is the witness here,

but I want us to get to the truth as to why the Office of Security

did not do an investigation. This goes to the core of the security

in this country and our operatives abroad.

I think the reason why the intelligence was so faulty and we

went to war against a sovereign nation was because of the failure

in your office and the CIA to have accurate information.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for this time.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank the gentlelady.

Mr. Van Hollen.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the witnesses for their testimony. I think you can hear that the members

of the committee are pretty stunned that no investigation was undertaken into these breaches.

My question, I just want to understand, is it a matter of White

House security policy that if there is a criminal investigation into

a leak out of the White House that the security office does not undertake its own investigation or administrative action?

Mr. KNODELL. We would not run a collateral investigation.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Let me make sure I understand this. You have

somebody who’s accused of leaking, there’s a court proceeding that

may go on for years and years and years, the alleged leaker continues to be in the White House, continues to be potentially there to

leak information, and it’s the policy of the White House to take no

action to ask any question of the alleged leaker to determine

whether or not that person’s security clearance at the very least

should be revoked.

Mr. KNODELL. No, that is not the case.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. What is the case?

Mr. KNODELL. An investigation should be done.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. An investigation should be done, right?

Mr. KNODELL. Correct.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. But an investigation was not done?

Mr. KNODELL. That’s correct.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Clearly the standard in the criminal investigation like this one, one of the questions was whether people had

knowledge of whether there was a covert—someone was a covert

operative. But the standard as I understand for your purposes is

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simply a question of whether classified information was disclosed.

Isn’t that right?

Mr. KNODELL. Can you rephrase that for me, please?

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. In other words, as I understand the regulations, your office has an obligation to undertake an investigation

when classified information has been disclosed.

Mr. KNODELL. Correct.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. There’s not as a preliminary matter any question of whether it was intentional disclosure, you’re supposed to

look into any disclosure, isn’t that right?

Mr. KNODELL. That’s right.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. My question, and I understand a little time

has lapsed, but given what you just testified to, why aren’t you undertaking an investigation today? These are all now publicly disclosed information, publicly disclosed classified information by officials in the White House. You have said it is not the policy to suspend an administration proceeding pending a criminal investigation. It is very possible that people, and it looks very likely that

people clearly leaked classified information. Why aren’t we taking

an investigation today?

Mr. KNODELL. Mr. Congressman, I will take this back, we’ll review this when I get back to the office, I’ll review this with senior

management. We need to ensure that all criminal investigations

have been concluded, and we will certainly look into it.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. If I can just stop you on that; I understand the

criminal investigation is being concluded but I understood your testimony a minute ago to say that you would conduct an administrative investigation even during the pending criminal investigation.

Mr. KNODELL. No, sir.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. So then it is the policy of the White House not

to undertake any administrative investigation as long as there are

criminal investigations going. Is that written down somewhere?

Mr. KNODELL. D-SKID 6.8, I believe where there will not be a

collateral investigation. I believe. I believe that’s the case.

Mr. LEONARD. Can I clarify something, Mr. Congressman? Clearly when there is a need for an administrative inquiry and a criminal investigation you have a situation where there are in fact competing priorities and so at the very least it can be awkward.

So I’m not too sure we can say that there’s a hard fast rule one

way or the other because quite frankly there could be situations

where someone can make a case that an administrative inquiry

while there’s a criminal investigation going on can amount to obstruction of justice. So those types of things have to be sorted out

and there is no clear-cut issue.

From a classification point of view I would submit that the immediate concern should first and foremost be let’s make sure that

we’re not going to have any additional security violations that

would result in additional compromises, and that should not wait.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Let me if I may, Mr. Chairman, the GAO has

looked into this issue and it’s clear, as I understand, the rules of

the White House are supposed to be similar to the rules that apply

in any agency, is that right, with respect to how you treat these?

Mr. KNODELL. That’s right.

59

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. I know other Federal officials have routinely

lost their security clearances pending investigations into potential

leaks of classified information and without even the case when

criminal charges were not filed.

For example, Sergeant Samuel Provence had a security clearance

revoked after he talked to several media outlets about the mistreatment of a 16-year-old boy and other abuses by interrogators at Abu

Ghraib prison in Iraq. He was not indicted or accused of criminal

wrongdoing.

Here’s someone who made a statement, a public statement about

abuses at Abu Ghraib and his security clearance was temporarily

suspended, and yet you have clear evidence of top officials in the

White House having disclosed classified information and no action

was taken.

I have to ask you to go back and take a look at whether or not

there’s really a prohibition on moving forward. Clearly now that

the criminal investigation is over, it seems one should be launched

even if in fact that did prohibit an investigation from going forward

before.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you, Mr. Van Hollen. That certainly

appears to be a double standard.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. To clarify, my understanding is the leak

occurred on July 13th, and within the month, I don’t know if it was

July 14th but certainly in July, we know the CIA made their referral to the Justice Department. So it was immediately under investigation by the Justice Department.

Now it took Attorney General Ashcroft several months before he

recused himself and got someone else on board, but there was an

immediate criminal investigation, isn’t that correct?

Mr. KNODELL. That’s my understanding.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. That would change the dimensions in

terms of whether you would do your own investigation.

Mr. KNODELL. Correct.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Or leave it to the professionals at the

Justice Department.

Let me just ask, in terms of an individual who may have inadvertently outed an operative or a memorandum or something during that time, once the criminal side gets kicked in, at that point

they have the right to allow that to move forward, protect themselves, and at that point I don’t know if it relieves them of the obligation but they certainly have fifth amendment rights at that point

that could lead them to not go forward with that, is that correct?

Mr. LEONARD. That would be correct.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Thank you.

Chairman WAXMAN. Before I recognize Mr. Hodes, the President

of the United States made statements when this hit the press that

he was outraged and he was going to be conducting an investigation and heads would roll. He said if anybody in the White House

disclosed this information about a covert agent, that person would

be fired. Later he modified and said they would have to be convicted of a crime. But it turns out that the President didn’t even

ask anybody to do an investigation. If he wanted to get the truth

all he had to do was call Carl Rove and Ari Fleischer and Scooter

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Libby and all these people into his office and say, hey, how did this

information get out, who did it?

If he thought it was a problem, he could have said you’re not

going to get access to other security information. Isn’t that why the

White House can do it contemporaneously with ay criminal investigation, Mr. Leonard?

Mr. LEONARD. As I indicated, Mr. Chairman, when you have

those competing priorities or competing interests, it can make an

awkward situation, but those are the types of things that would

have to be worked out.

Chairman WAXMAN. Sounds like the competing priority was not

to allow his administration and top personnel to be embarrassed by

the truth.

Mr. Hodes.

Mr. HODES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Gentlemen, you both

agree that the national security of the United States is the most

important thing we have to consider, notwithstanding competing

priorities. Would you both agree to that?

Mr. LEONARD. Yes, sir.

Mr. Knodell. Yes, sir.

Mr. HODES. Mr. Knodell, you came in in August 2004 to the

White House, is that correct?

Mr. KNODELL. Correct.

Mr. HODES. You serve how, sir, at the pleasure of the President?

Mr. KNODELL. No, sir, I’m a career employee.

Mr. HODES. I’m sorry?

Mr. KNODELL. Career employee.

Mr. HODES. Are you an attorney?

Mr. KNODELL. I am not.

Mr. HODES. Who was your predecessor at the White House.

Mr. KNODELL. Jeffrey Thompson.

Mr. HODES. Where is he now?

Mr. KNODELL. I don’t know. Last I heard, he had moved to Georgia.

Mr. HODES. When you came into your position, did Mr. Thompson brief you on the situation in the White House and what had

or had not occurred with respect to investigations into the potential

breach of classified information?

Mr. KNODELL. No, sir.

Mr. HODES. Let me ask you this, what discussions, if any have

you had with the President of the United States about initiating

an investigation into the now clear, obvious security breaches that

have occurred?

Mr. KNODELL. None.

Mr. HODES. What discussions, if any, have you had with the Vice

President of the United States?

Mr. KNODELL. None.

Mr. HODES. What discussions have any of you had with Carl

Rove?

Mr. KNODELL. None.

Mr. HODES. What discussions, if any, have you had with anyone

about whether or not you should or should not institute an investigation into the security breaches that are the subject of this hearing today?

61

Mr. KNODELL. I have had no conversations.

Mr. HODES. You haven’t talked to anybody?

Mr. KNODELL. That’s correct.

Mr. HODES. So when you say you’re going to go back to the White

House and take it up with senior management, you’re senior management, aren’t you?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, sir, I am.

Mr. HODES. So you’re going to go back and talk to yourself about

whether or not you’re going to conduct an investigation; is that

what you want this panel to believe?

Mr. KNODELL. I report to several people.

Mr. HODES. Who do you report to, sir?

Mr. KNODELL. I report to Tom Dryer.

Mr. HODES. Who is he?

Mr. KNODELL. He is the Deputy Chief Operations Officer.

Mr. HODES. For what?

Mr. KNODELL. For the Office of Administration.

Mr. HODES. Do you report to anybody else?

Mr. KNODELL. He’s my direct report.

Mr. HODES. Who does he report to?

Mr. KNODELL. He reports to Sandra Evans.

Mr. HODES. Who’s Sandra Evans?

Mr. KNODELL. Operations Officer. I’m sorry, within OA. And then

the COO reports to Mr. Allen Swindeman, he’s the Director of OA.

Mr. HODES. Does anybody report back to the White House?

Mr. KNODELL. Mr. Swindeman is our Director.

Mr. HODES. He reports to the White House?

Mr. KNODELL. He is a political appointee.

Mr. HODES. Do you agree with me, Mr. Knodell, that the NIE is

a classified document?

Mr. KNODELL. Pardon me?

Mr. HODES. Do you agree that the National Intelligence Estimate

before it is declassified is a classified document?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, sir.

Mr. HODES. Are there procedures for declassifying the National

Intelligence Estimate?

Mr. KNODELL. I’m not familiar with specific declassification for

that document.

Mr. HODES. Mr. Leonard, are their procedures in place for declassifying the National Intelligence Estimate?

Mr. LEONARD. Yes, sir. As with any classified information, it can

become declassified pursuant to the original decisions as to when

it becomes declassified. It can be become declassified under the authorization of an authorized official and then it can also become declassified just by the mere passage of time.

Mr. HODES. If classified information is revealed without having

been properly declassified, that’s considered a leak, correct, Mr.

Leonard?

Mr. LEONARD. That’s an unauthorized disclosure, yes, sir.

Mr. HODES. Mr. Knodell, you agree with that, it’s considered a

leak if it’s not properly declassified?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes.

Mr. HODES. Leaking classified information is a crime, is it not,

Mr. Knodell?

62

Mr. KNODELL. Yes.

Mr. HODES. And if two or more persons agree to leak classified

information and one of those persons takes affirmative steps to do

something pursuant to that agreement, that could be considered a

criminal conspiracy, is that correct?

Mr. KNODELL. It could be, certainly.

Mr. HODES. Now it’s my understanding that Mr. Libby testified

that he was specifically authorized in advance to disclose key judgments of the classified National Intelligence Estimate to reporter

Judy Miller because Vice President Cheney believed it important to

do so. Mr. Libby also testified that the Vice President told him that

the President had given the authorization to disclose portions of

the National Intelligence Estimate.

In your experience, gentlemen, in government, have you ever

seen such selective declassification before?

Mr. LEONARD. I’m not aware of any similar type of action such

as that, no, sir.

Mr. HODES. Do you know of any legal basis for there to be selective declassification to a few reporters of the National Intelligence

Estimate? And I want to tell you on the date that was supposedly

disclosed by Mr. Libby, July 8th, in the following 10 days administration officials told folks that the NIE was still classified, and it

was formally declassified on July 18th.

Can you explain to this panel how if Mr. Libby had authority

from the President or the Vice President to declassify the NIE on

July 8th, the administration continued to claim that it was classified for 10 days and then apparently declassified it again on July

18th.

Mr. LEONARD. I don’t have any firsthand knowledge to address

any of that, sir.

Mr. KNODELL. Nor do I.

Mr. HODES. Does it raise any questions for you?

Mr. LEONARD. The provisions of the Executive order, as I had indicated, clearly provides for instances where classified information

can be declassified even when it otherwise meets the standards for

continued classification. And then ultimately the exercise of classification and declassification authority is the President’s absolute

authority. It’s not derived from any law or regulation or Executive

order, it’s his Article II constitutional authority to be used absolutely.

Mr. HODES. Assuming that to be the case, is it your testimony

that the President could choose to selectively declassify the National Intelligence Estimate and give directions that it could be declassified to be used with three reporters but then still retain—and

that document is still classified?

Chairman WAXMAN. The gentleman’s time has expired, but we do

want an answer.

Mr. LEONARD. Sir, it’s my testimony that it is the President’s absolute authority when it comes to the classification and declassification of information.

Chairman WAXMAN. Ms. Norton.

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Knodell, I’m looking at your title, Director, Office of Security. I’m trying to establish whether you have any authority. Do you regard yourself as having any independent or indeVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:42 Jan 22, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00066 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\38579.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
63

pendent authority apart from others who report directly to the

President of the United States? Do you have any ability to initiate

investigations or other action on your own?

Mr. KNODELL. I would coordinate that through our legal counsel

within the Office of Administration and the Director of the Office

of Administration.

Ms. NORTON. You are testifying that you would not initiate any

action on your own without in fact reporting up through some

chain of command. This is not in any way an independent office,

and you essentially are someone who makes recommendation to

somebody else about investigations?

Mr. KNODELL. In essence, yes.

Ms. NORTON. You have to get a sign-off from someone to do an

investigation?

Mr. KNODELL. Not initially, no. Not initially. We can start an investigation. We start security violations if security violations come

in.

Ms. NORTON. Without reporting it, that’s what you’re doing?

Mr. KNODELL. I would report it once we started the investigation.

Ms. NORTON. You could be stopped from doing that?

Mr. KNODELL. That’s never been the case in the past.

Ms. NORTON. You haven’t apparently done such, at least in respect to this controversy?

Let me ask you a question about what we do know. We do know

that Mr. Rove spoke to two reporters, and we know who they were,

Robert Novak and Matthew Cooper. We do know that he denied he

had spoken with any employers—excuse me, with any reporters.

Indeed he claimed he wasn’t involved at all.

I’m going to ask that a video clip be rolled from a press conference, White House press conference, involving the spokesman

Scott McClellan addressing the Press Corps.

[Video shown.]

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Knodell, can you explain why Mr. Rove still

has a security clearance today, or does he?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, he does.

Ms. NORTON. Given the admissions that apparently are clear,

why does he have that security clearance today?

Mr. KNODELL. It’s my understanding that the criminal investigation didn’t find any criminal wrongdoing.

Ms. NORTON. I’m very disturbed by what went back and forth on

criminal and administrative responsibilities here because you seem

to testify that even if a matter that could risk the security of the

United States or of a covert agent is involved, that the administrative process ought to stand back until a process with a much higher

level or standard of proof is required has finished its course.

Wouldn’t that risk security not to even begin an investigation to

see whether there is anything that can be begun to protect whatever might be the security breach quite apart from whether there’s

been a criminal violation?

Mr. KNODELL. I think as a result of the criminal investigation it

clearly didn’t show, that I have seen in the press, I have not seen

the criminal investigative reports, that there was no criminal

wrongdoing.

64

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Knodell, my question is: Does the security of

the United States depend upon the outcome of a criminal proceeding or is there not in your office a duty to proceed as far as you

can to protect security using the administrative or civil process?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, ma’am, absolutely. It’s not that we’re just not

protecting the White House complex and the classified materials.

Ms. NORTON. I can’t hear you.

Mr. KNODELL. We are protecting the classified——

Ms. NORTON. Even without an investigation, so that you might

even plug the leak while the U.S. Attorney is trying to find out

using his processes who done it?

Mr. Knodell, I’m suggesting that at your level you could plug

leaks even while the criminal process is under way and under investigation. And I want you to look at the very same set of employees. If I could have up the White House——

Chairman WAXMAN. Ms. Norton, your time has expired. Members

have said they want a second round. We do have another panel

waiting to testify. I don’t want to deny Members opportunities to

ask questions. What I would like my colleagues to do is I will recognize Members for a second round. Could we limit to 3-minute

second rounds? Does anybody find a problem with that?

So then we’ll do that. Members will now be recognized for further

questioning. And, Mr. Cummings, I’m going to start with you if you

have further questions.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. We up

here, Mr. Knodell, we have an obligation to try to make sure that

we uphold the laws of this country and try to make sure those laws

are enforced, and protecting the identity of a covert agent is very

important to us, and I hope you understand that, and protecting

classified information. We’re trying to help you do your job.

During Ms. Wilson’s testimony the ranking member, Mr. Davis,

kept making a point that a key issue in whether Mr. Rove and

other White House officials knew Ms. Wilson was a covert agent.

I do agree that this is relevant. If the White House knowingly disclosed a covert agent, that would obviously be a very serious matter. My understanding is that the regulations do not prohibit only

intentional disclosures, they also prohibit negligent disclosures.

Mr. Leonard, is my understanding accurate that the Executive

order governing the handling of classified information prohibits

knowing, willful or negligent disclosures of classified information,

is that right?

Mr. LEONARD. Yes, sir, that’s absolutely right. Regardless of the

intent, the damage is still the same. Again, the first objective

would be to make sure we don’t have recurrences, and if just people

are ignorant we would like to brief them and what have you, and

then if there is intent or culpability, that can be taken up by means

of sanctions.

Mr. CUMMINGS. By the way, Mr. Knodell, has there been any

briefing as referred to by Mr. Leonard with regard to Mr. Rove or

anybody else in the White House since this happened, since this

disclosure took place?

Mr. KNODELL. A briefing in regards to?

65

Mr. CUMMINGS. He just said one of the things you want to do is

brief people about the rules and regulations so it doesn’t happen

again. Did you brief anybody?

Mr. KNODELL. Congressman, yes, we do. We supply an indoctrination security briefing for people when they first come on board

and then their first anniversary date and every year after we have

annual refreshing briefs.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Did you use this as an example, by the way?

This is like out there, I mean it’s here.

Mr. KNODELL. No, sir.

Mr. CUMMINGS. You didn’t say, look, this is what happened and

we don’t want this to happen again. You never did that?

Mr. KNODELL. No, sir.

Mr. LEONARD. I can tell you, Mr. Congressman, in November, December 2005, maybe even a little bit of 2006, there were a series

of special briefings for all cleared personnel in the Executive Office

of the President, mandatory briefings for senior management on

down, and these types of issues were in fact covered during the

course of those briefings, and this was publicly—the public was

made aware of these.

Mr. CUMMINGS. So even if Carl Rove or any other White House

official did not know that Ms. Wilson’s employment status was

classified, the disclosure of such information to an individual not

authorized to receive it could have been a violation of the Executive

order, and that is an Executive order of the President of the United

States, is that right?

Mr. KNODELL. That’s correct.

Mr. CUMMINGS. So basically the President set up some rules and

then he said I’m going to make sure that if anybody violated these

rules, they’re going to have major problems and they’re going to

have to go, and then the next thing you know there is apparently

a violation but no action, is that right?

Mr. KNODELL. Other than the criminal proceedings, no action

from my office.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you.

Chairman WAXMAN. I’m sorry we don’t have clips of the President making statements about how he was going to do an investigation and heads would roll, but I guess we will have to leave

that to the Daily Show for their presentation.

Ms. Watson, I’m going to call on you next if you have additional

questions.

Ms. WATSON. Yes. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Knodell, this oversight hearing is called the ‘‘White House

Procedures for Safeguarding Classified Information.’’

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, ma’am.

Ms. WATSON. In the first round I asked you what your position

was. You clearly said that you have not held any investigation and

your role is the Director of Office of Security. Have you or do you

feel that you have carried out your duties?

Chairman WAXMAN. Could I ask the gentlelady not to ask a

harsh question of Mr. Knodell? He’s here and I think he’s been

asked some tough questions, but let’s try to keep them a little bit

less personal.

66

Ms. WATSON. I just want to know, I want to have some clarity

as to what the responsibility of your position in your office is.

There’s a gap for me that you have this position but there’s been

no investigation.

Mr. KNODELL. Congresswoman, like I said, and I say with all due

respect, the reason we did not initiate an investigation is because

there was a criminal proceeding that was already underway. There

was already an investigation underway.

Ms. WATSON. But the criminal procedure is over.

Mr. KNODELL. I have not been notified that it is officially over.

Ms. WATSON. Thank you. I have no other questions, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you, Ms. Watson. I’m going to recognize myself because I want to point out that there seems to be interesting other examples where we’ve had disclosures of leaks. This

is not the only time questions have arisen about how the Bush administration White House handles classified information.

For example, journalist and author Bob Woodward wrote in the

introduction of his 2002 book, Bush at War, that the book was

based in part on, ‘‘contemporaneous notes taken during National

Security Council and other meetings where the most important decisions were discussed and made,’’ and that, ‘‘written record, both

classified and unclassified.’’

Mr. Woodward also stated war planning and war making involves secret information. I have used a good deal of it trying to

provide new specific details without harming sensitive operations

or relationships with foreign governments. This is not a sanitized

version, and the sense is if we had them in the United States,

thank God we don’t, no doubt would draw the line at a different,

more restrictive place than I have, end quote.

Mr. Knodell, Mr. Woodward’s statements indicate he had remarkable classified information of the most sensitive information.

Were Mr. Woodward’s circumstances unique or were White House

disclosures of classified information to him and to journalists in the

case of Mrs. Wilson part of a broader pattern of White House disclosures or of classified information to selected journalists and authors? We see now this is not unique to get classified information

to people.

It’s noteworthy the administration—let me ask you to respond to

that. Looks like Mr. Woodward had information that was classified.

He seems to admit it.

Mr. KNODELL. I have no knowledge of that.

Chairman WAXMAN. Well, so when the administration, however,

is concerned that there are questions about the disclosure of sensitive information by administration critics, there seems to be different results. For example, January 2004, within 1 day of former

Secretary of Treasury Paul O’Neill’s television interview in which

he voiced criticism of the Bush administration, the administration

publicly announced it was investigating whether Secretary O’Neill

had improperly disclosed confidential information. OK. They didn’t

like what he had to say but they’re going to immediately investigate him.

On June 20, 2002, an irate Vice President Cheney reportedly told

congressional leaders that the President had deep concerns about

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media accounts from just 1 day earlier when it got out that the National Security Agency on September 10, 2001 had communication

intercepts with cryptic references to possible attacks the next day.

The report cited congressional sources and congressional leaders.

Immediately requested a Justice Department investigation of the

matter.

The administration seems to be inconsistent in their approach in

these cases, and it’s troubling. They raise very serious questions

about whether White House policies on sensitive information is

driven by political considerations. If it’s a critic they are going to

investigate, they’re going to really stop it. When it comes to people

in-house, people they like, people they trust, well, the investigation

hasn’t even started with regard to those people.

I’m not asking a question, but just making this part of the

record.

Mr. Davis.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Mr. Chairman, I think it goes both ways

in terms of selective oversight and selective investigations. This

committee ought to also be looking at the NIE leaks on the Iraq

war, National Intelligence Estimates which were leaked. It can do

damage. The NSA collection and monitoring of certain phone information, which was leaked, classified secret information. The East

European CIA detention facilities leaks. The intelligence activities

toward Iran leaks.

We can all be selective on this and we all understand the partisanship and everything else that goes on with this, which has

been thoroughly vetted and investigated. We do of course have a

responsibility to take a look at what the procedures are to make

sure these things don’t occur again. That’s really the purpose of

oversight, not as much as to look back but look forward to make

sure these things do not happen again.

Mr. Leonard, let me ask, does the President or the Vice President

have authority to declassify on the spot?

Mr. LEONARD. As I mentioned earlier, Mr. Davis, the President’s

authority in this area is absolute pursuant to the Constitution.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. So they can do it on the spot. Can they

declassify for limited purposes?

Mr. LEONARD. Absolutely, sir.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Once again the leak to Novak, which is

I think what started this whole thing, is there any evidence that

anyone in the White House had any knowledge that Valerie Plame

was a covert operative? Does anybody have any evidence of that?

Mr. LEONARD. I have no firsthand information.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Do you, Mr. Knodell?

Mr. KNODELL. No, I do not.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. In terms of the obligation to disclose once

it became apparent that she was a covert operative, a criminal investigation was initiated almost immediately by the CIA, with a referral to the Justice Department. Is that correct?

Mr. KNODELL. That’s my understanding, yes.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. That’s my understanding as well, within

the month. It might have been a day, I don’t know what that time

period was, and I hope the committee can find out. Once that

criminal investigation is underway with the referral that sends it

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to Justice, now Mr. Fitzpatrick didn’t come in until the Attorney

General recused himself sometime later, but an investigation was

already underway. What does that do to the obligations to disclose

at that point? Does that put employees in a position of having to

decide if they’re going to exercise fifth amendment rights and the

like and does the purpose of the Executive order at that point really become pointless if you have an investigation this?

You haven’t thought that through?

Mr. LEONARD. I have, sir, and I would submit that the Executive

order is not pointless at that point in time. Again, this is an instance where you have competing national interests. I had over 30

years in the Department of Defense and there were many times

where senior leadership in the Department of Defense did battle

with the Department of Justice, the FBI, where there were instances where the national security issues at risk far outweighed

whatever criminal investigative priorities the Bureau or the Justice

Department had. These are things that have to be worked out on

a case-by-case basis. This is one instance where there is no absolutes.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. So we’re in some gray areas at this

point?

Mr. LEONARD. Yes, sir.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Thank you very much.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you, Mr. Davis. Mr. Van Hollen.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr.

Leonard, let me just note that after this information was first disclosed in the Novak column on or about July 26, 2003, White

House press spokesman McClellan stated: Let me make it very

clear, that’s not the way this White House operates.

Two months later and still before they’d even called for an investigation by the Justice Department, on September 29, 2003, Mr.

McClellan addressed the White House Press Corps and over 30

times stated that they had no information regarding the involvement of any White House officials.

I think we understand today why there was no information. No

investigation was done.

You talked about competing national priorities. Clearly in this 2-

month period there weren’t competing priorities, were there? In

other words, before the criminal investigation was authorized there

were no competing priorities?

Mr. LEONARD. To my knowledge, that’s correct.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Yet based on your understanding of the regulations in the statute and the information that was out in the

press, which clearly raised suspicions of unauthorized disclosure of

information, wouldn’t that have triggered an investigation in your

view?

Mr. LEONARD. Again, in circumstances like that, even if it was

just an inadvertent, out of ignorance disclosure, you would want to

find out why it happened so you could preclude it from happening

again, even if it’s by ignorance.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Not just that you would want to but you have

an obligation?

Mr. LEONARD. Yes, sir.

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Mr. VAN HOLLEN. With respect to the pendency of the criminal

proceedings, as I understand your testimony, there is nothing in

the statute or the regulations that prohibits you from doing this

other investigation under the regulations and revoking a security

clearance, isn’t that correct?

Mr. LEONARD. Concomitantly while there is an investigation

going on? You’re absolutely right.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. You’re absolutely free to do that; nothing prohibits you from undertaking an investigation, an administrative action?

Mr. LEONARD. The directive is very clear that when there is evidence of potential criminality, that there would be the requirement

to coordinate with legal counsel and the requirement to coordinate

with the Department of Justice with the expectation that again

those issues would be worked out.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Worked out in coordination.

Mr. LEONARD. Yes, sir.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Knodell, if I could just ask you, do you

know of any, and this doesn’t mean you are personally privy to the

conversations, but have you heard of communications within the

White House that bear on the question of whether or not an investigation of security breaches should have been conducted?

Mr. KNODELL. No, I have not.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. You don’t know, whether it’s direct communications or hearsay, since you have been there. Have you had any

conversations with anybody in the White House about the disclosures that have been——

Mr. KNODELL. No, I have not.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you, Mr. Van Hollen. Mr. Hodes.

Mr. HODES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Knodell, do employees sign nondisclosure agreements agreeing not to disclose classified information in connection with your briefings of them?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, they do. At the time they they’re issued a

clearance they sign a nondisclosure agreement.

Mr. HODES. Am I correct that those nondisclosure agreements

and security clearances are reviewed every 5 years?

Mr. KNODELL. That’s correct.

Mr. HODES. I understand that Mr. Rove came into service in the

White House in 2001, is that correct?

Mr. KNODELL. I believe so.

Mr. HODES. So in 2006 you would have conducted review of Mr.

Rove’s security clearance?

Mr. KNODELL. We would have initiated a reinvestigation, that’s

correct, with the FBI. The FBI conducts our background investigations.

Mr. HODES. Are you aware that has in fact happened with Mr.

Rove?

Mr. KNODELL. I don’t have first-hand knowledge now, but I could

very easily go back and check.

Mr. HODES. So there would be documents which someone in the

Federal Government has about whether or not Mr. Rove, for example, ought to still have his security clearance.

Mr. KNODELL. Correct.

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Mr. HODES. And do you agree with me that, under the regulations, whether a person is truthful and complete in their answers

to questions and whether or not they are—the person is disposed

toward candor is an important factor in determining whether someone continues to have access to classified action?

Mr. KNODELL. That is considered in the adjudication process, yes.

Mr. HODES. And if someone lied about what they did, that would

be important, wouldn’t it?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, it would.

Mr. HODES. You have now heard and seen on this video Mr.

McClellan say that Mr. Rove told him he had nothing to do with

security leaks, but we know that Mr. Rove did leak classified information. Does that indicate to you that such a lack of candor should

lead to a reexamination of Mr. Rove’s security clearance?

Mr. KNODELL. I clearly don’t know the content of their conversation.

Mr. HODES. Is it something that—anything you have heard today

or read in the press or read anywhere else raises a question in your

mind as the senior security officer in the White House about

whether or not you ought to go and ask some questions about it?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, we could do that.

Mr. HODES. Will you do it?

Mr. KNODELL. I will discuss that with senior management.

Mr. HODES. And will you get back to us and let us know what

senior management and you discuss and what you conclude, sir?

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, I will.

Mr. HODES. Does Mr. Libby still have his security clearance as

of this date?

Mr. KNODELL. No, he does not.

Mr. HODES. When was that removed?

Mr. KNODELL. The day he resigned, I believe it was.

Mr. HODES. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN [presiding]. Thank you.

Ms. Norton.

Ms. NORTON. Could I have back the White House chart?

I ask Mr. Knodell to look at the middle row; and I would like

your view, Mr. Knodell, given the Executive order which you are

charged to enforce in 12958, whether you think any of those officials or any officials in the White House, besides the President,

would meet the standards of the Executive order which, as you

know, are informational if you are conducting an investigation, if

there is an official need to know.

What if you need to verify information concerning security?

Would any of those officials have had a need to know the name of

a covert agent?

Mr. KNODELL. I really wouldn’t know.

Ms. NORTON. You are the man charged with enforcing the Executive Order 12958 and your answer is what?

Mr. KNODELL. I don’t know if they would have a need to know.

I don’t have enough information.

Ms. NORTON. Because that depends on what they say? Isn’t that

a matter of regulation and law? I am saying based on their position.

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Mr. KNODELL. People do have to have a need to know for someone with classified information to pass classified information. They

also have to make sure that there is a non-disclosure agreement.

Ms. NORTON. So the need to know the name of a covert agent,

you can think of a circumstance where an official, one of those officials, would need to know the name of a covert agent, and I have

just given you the basis.

Mr. KNODELL. Yes, ma’am. I don’t know what the White House

does day to day in their operations and who they’re staying in contact with.

Ms. NORTON. So day-to-day operations, that could change; and

how can anyone find out the name of a covert agent, given changes

in day-to-day operations in the White House?

Mr. KNODELL. No, ma’am. I don’t know if any of those folks

would have a need to know.

Ms. NORTON. Let me say frankly you to you, Mr. Knodell, I don’t

think you need—I think that—I congratulate you on your willingness to be here. I know you wouldn’t have been here if the White

House hadn’t sent you. I am interested in remedy, because national

security is involved in this.

Normally, the notion of the White House investigating itself is

perfectly understandable where there is not a national security

matter involved. But if I may say so, I really do think, given what

you have testified concerning your office, that you are truly the fall

guy here. I say that because you have testified that you felt a virtual injunction as an administrative agent without coordinating

with your superiors, all of whom—obviously, the high-level support

to the President of the United States. You clearly don’t think you

could do an independent investigation. Do you think that this investigation should lie with someone more independent than you?

Chairman WAXMAN. The gentlelady’s time has expired, but if the

gentleman wants to respond.

Mr. KNODELL. I am good.

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, you gave him the option to respond.

Chairman WAXMAN. You don’t want to respond to the question?

Mr. KNODELL. No.

Chairman WAXMAN. Well, I want to thank the two of you very

much for being here. You have been very helpful, Mr. Knodell. You

came here on short notice, and it’s not been an easy time for you.

However, I guess you sense the frustration of the members of this

committee when we hear of a breach of national security and we

were told the President was going to do an investigation and the

White House has virtually done nothing, not even to take away the

security clearances pending any other investigation by anyone else.

But those are my comments, and I want to thank both of you for

being here.

We have a third panel waiting to come up.

For panel No. 3, the Chair would like to call forward Mr. Mark

Zaid, an attorney with the extent of experience representing government employees accused of mishandling classified information;

and Ms. Victoria Toensing, an attorney in private practice and a

former Senate staffer.

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I want to welcome you both to our hearing today. Your prepared

statements will be in the record in their entirety. I would like to

ask you for your oral presentation to be limited to 5 minutes.

It is the practice of this committee to ask all witnesses to take

an oath. So if you would please stand and raise your right hands

[Witnesses sworn.]

Chairman WAXMAN. The record will reflect the witnesses answered in the affirmative.

Mr. Zaid, why don’t we start with you.

STATEMENTS OF MARK ZAID, ESQUIRE; AND VICTORIA

TOENSING, ESQUIRE

STATEMENT OF MARK ZAID

Mr. ZAID. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee.

It’s my pleasure to testify again before this body.

For nearly 15 years, I have been among a handful of attorneys

nationwide who regularly handle civil litigation and administrative

matters involving national security claims. This includes all aspects of security clearance suspensions, denials, revocations, statutory and first amendment challenge to classification decisions, leak

investigations and general employment disputes that may arise

within the Intel, military and law enforcement communities. In the

exercise of my legal responsibilities, I often have authorized access

to classified information.

We’ve heard of the operative documents that pertain to this

topic, Executive Order 12958, which was amended by 13292, and

also Executive Order 12968. Agencies throughout the Federal Government have adopted implementing regulations attuned to their

specific situations. But those are the operative documents that we

really rely on.

Section 41 of EO 13292 deals with who actually grants or is accorded access to classified information. There has to be a favorable

determination of eligibility. There has to be an executed, approved

non-disclosure agreement; and there has to be a need-to-know determination.

Each of these components is factually based. Indeed, whether a

need to know exists is a question that is asked and answered by

tens of thousands of Federal employees and contractors thousands

of times every day as part of their routine responsibilities.

However, the underlying premise of that first prong, the determination of eligibility, deals with a judgment determination, one of

common sense that is often referred to as the ‘‘whole person concept.’’

Unfortunately, the system is anything but uniform. The process

by which clearances or where access is granted very significantly

based on the level of clearance, interim clearances can be very easily granted with very little effort by an agency. Most agencies, as

we have heard, will go through a periodic background investigation

that usually extends 7 to 15 years for the individual; and periodic

reinvestigations will reoccur between 5 and 10 years, depending on

the backlog of the agency involved and the level of clearance.

To be blunt, we can discuss all day what the regulations state,

what minimal due process might be required or expected in sceVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:42 Jan 22, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00076 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\38579.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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narios touching upon today’s hearing topic and what outcome a

reasonable person would apply in any specific case; and that would

be an academically and legally fascinating discussion, at least for

me. But the fact is the recitation of real-world anecdotal experiences by those who operate in this field will educate you with very

different results.

It is best to characterize any substantive discussion of security

clearances and agencies, and procedures surrounding such determinations, as arbitrary and fraught with inconsistencies. Periodically, every agency derives its authorities from these operative documents. Implementation varies across the board. With some agencies, the process works very well. With others, it is particularly broken. Overall, the system works but with numerous flaws, many of

which can be repaired through legislative oversight or correction,

though, to be sure, it is likely that any such attempt will engender

cries of constitutional overreach by any White House.

Let me use this opportunity to go through a few observations

from cases I have handled over the years.

Whether the unauthorized disclosure of classified information results in administrative, civil, or criminal sanctions against an individual is a very fact-based inquiry for which no general rule truly

exists. The suspension of an individual’s security clearance can

arise from the receipt of unsubstantiated anonymous allegations or

can occur after a thorough internal investigation. At what stage

suspension occurs is up to the specific agency.

Moreover, the type of suspension is not deemed to be—this type

of suspension is not deemed to be an adverse personnel action and

therefore does not afford the person the substantive challenge

rights as soon as he is notified of the substantive challenges that

exist.

Again, a very fact-based inquiry for which no general rule exists.

Some agencies will utilize a security suspension to suspend the

employee’s employment altogether, pending conclusion of an investigation which could take years. This may be paid administrative

leave, this may be unpaid administrative leave, and if that clearance is reinstated at some point in the future there is no compensation given to that individual whatsoever.

Again, a very fact-based inquiry for which no general rule truly

exists.

Punishment for an unauthorized disclosure can range from no action to something as merely administrative as a reprimand, oral or

written, in the file. Could be more serious, such as the revocation

of a clearance or, depending on the factual circumstances, criminal

prosecution.

Again, a very fact-based inquiry.

Significant inconsistencies exist governing agencies’ determination of access to classified info. Significant inconsistencies exist governing an individual’s ability to challenge a revocation or suspension or denial. Significant inconsistencies exist as to how agencies’

security investigations are initiated or handled.

Most agencies experience serious and harmful time delays with

respect to security investigations that seriously impact an employee

or contractor’s life and, in fact, creates additional security concerns

that did not previously exist.

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An appeal of a clearance revocation is usually—or denial—will

take often 6 to 12 months; and if it is the CIA, we may be talking

2 to 3 years. Investigations into the leaks of classified information

rarely result in either discipline or prosecution for a variety of reasons, including the failure of Federal agencies to cooperate with

one another.

And the training for authorized holders of classified info with respect to this need to know differs from the positions the executive

branch will espouse in adverse litigation for judicial proceedings.

In my testimony, I set forth a few recommendations that the

committee can look into implementing. I will leave that in the

record.

I will just conclude by saying that this is an area that cries out

for vigorous legislative oversight, especially given recent efforts by

the executive branch to expand criminal penalties governing disclosures of classified information or unauthorized disclosure to beyond

those under any affirmative obligations which protect such info.

I encourage this committee to remain steadfast in its vision to

ensure accountability, efficiency, and fairness while combating opposition from the executive branch, no matter which party may be

in power.

I am more than happy to provide an elaboration to any of those

points or anything to this hearing topic or during any Q&A that

is submitted later.

Thank you.

Ms. WATSON [presiding]. Thank you.

Now Ms. Victoria Toensing.

STATEMENT OF VICTORIA TOENSING

Ms. TOENSING. Madam Chairman, thank you for inviting me to

testify about safeguarding classified information. Since you also invited Valerie Plame here, I had to assume you also wanted to consider the protection of covert agents as specified under the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act, the act that was the basis for

the Special Counsel’s investigation.

My first assignment as chief counsel for the Senate Intelligence

Committee for Chairman Barry Goldwater was to get that law

passed. He put me in charge of negotiating with the parties, particularly with the press who vigorously opposed the legislation because they claimed it would curtail their ability to criticize the Intelligence Committee. It would have a chilling effect, the press argued.

In my prepared statement, I thoroughly discussed the structure

of the act, but I want to now discuss how, because it is important

to the press arguments, how we divided the types of persons who

could be prosecuted into two classes: journalists and government

employees having authorized access to classified information.

We drafted such a high standard for journalists that it is almost

impossible for a working journalist like Bob Novak in his column

to have violated the law. But we also did not want government employees to be chilled in reporting wrongdoing or prosecuted for accidentally saying someone’s name without having the specific knowledge and intent to ‘‘out’’ a covert person.

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That caution and respect for the mighty power of the criminal

law leads me to the main point of my testimony.

It was Chairman Goldwater’s grave concern in creating the legislation, the great libertarian, that if Congress was going to criminalize naming what in those days we referred to as ‘‘undercover personnel,’’ then the CIA better fulfill its responsibility by protecting

the cover of those employees.

Chairman Goldwater was most displeased at that time, and he

characterized the CIA’s cavalier treatment of protecting its undercover—and that’s how he referred to it before the law—of protecting their cover. And you see that concern when you study the law,

and you see it in one of the seven findings.

But, more importantly, we created a rare approach in the criminal statute. Usually in the criminal law, it is only the conduct of

the defendant that is at issue, but, in this law, Congress required

the CIA to take affirmative measures to conceal the government’s

relationship to that covert agent. No one can be prosecuted under

that law unless this requirement is fulfilled by being proved beyond

a reasonable doubt.

The statute also requires the CIA to report annually, starting in

February 1983, to the House and Senate Intel Committees on

these—whatever their affirmative measures were, whatever they

created to protect the identities of covert agents.

I think you might all want to check to see whether they have

ever fulfilled that mandate by the law, that legislative mandate.

But it comes to mind in the course of this 3-year investigation

and listening to even the testimony today, could the CIA produce

immediately—meaning do they already have it prepared and they

can hurry and get it prepared at your request—a list of all foreign

assigned personnel that it has designated covert under the act?

Does the CIA make any list available like that to people like their

spokesperson who has to get on the telephone with people like Bob

Novak and confirm or deny that somebody works at the CIA?

I have several other questions in my prepared statement, but I

want to go on to my last point, and—by turning to this particular

case where numerous persons were subpoenaed, repeatedly, some

of them, before a grand jury, threatened with prosecution in a matter that, in my legal experience, had no criminal basis.

If Valerie Plame were really covert under the law—I am not saying whatever they say in the halls of the CIA. If she were really

covert under the law, then why didn’t Robert Grenier, the CIA

briefer who talked to Scooter Libby and the Vice President about

Wilson’s wife working at the CIA, why didn’t he tell them that her

identity was covert? Why didn’t Richard Armitage, who said he was

the original leaker, of course, to Bob Novak, but he said, having

seen Plame’s name in a Department memo, he had never seen a

covert agent’s name in 28 years of government practice. So it was

a surprise to him. He didn’t know how Plame’s identity was—that

it wasn’t to be revealed. Neither did Mark Grossman, the Under

Secretary.

If the CIA was really being careful and had guidelines for all of

these covert agents, why did they allow Valerie Plame to contribute

$1,000 to Al Gore’s campaign and list her CIA cover business,

Brewster, Jennings and Associates, as her employer?

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Why did the CIA not ask Joe Wilson to sign a confidentiality

agreement about his mission to Niger? I can tell you I have to do

it. I don’t know, Mark, if you do it when you take a case, but I can’t

talk to someone for 1 hour without representation unless I sign a

confidentiality agreement, and then they might permit him to write

an op-ed piece in the New York Times about the trip, an act certain

to bring press attention when his wife’s name is in that.

I mean, this tradecraft is just appalling to me who has spent a

good deal of my life in government service having to deal with classified material and with the CIA in an oversight capacity.

The CIA never sent its top personnel to Bob Novak, like the director, and ask him, please, please don’t print; don’t publish this

name. What they said to him was, ‘‘Well, we would rather you not

do it, but she’s not going to have another foreign assignment,’’ so—

it was very cavalier.

They certainly knew, the CIA, how to go and send the top people

when they didn’t want—in December 2005, when they didn’t want

the New York Times to publish the NSA surveillance program.

I have—there’s—why didn’t CIA spokesman Bill Harlow who, according to Wilson’s autobiography—and you spoke with Valerie

Plame about it—and he had been alerted that Bob Novak was

sniffing around, why did he confirm for Bob Novak that Valerie

Plame worked at the CIA? Why did Bill Harlow tell Vice Presidential Staffer Kathy Martin that Wilson’s wife worked at the

agency but not warn her, ‘‘Oh, you shouldn’t be giving up this identity?’’

Why did the CIA give Plame a job at its headquarters in Langley

when it is mandated by the statute, ‘‘to conceal a covert agent’s intelligence relationship to the United States.’’

And if this was really a violation of the Covert Agent Identities

Bill, why did the CIA send to the Justice Department a boilerplate,

11-question criminal referral for classified information violation

when its lawyers had to know—or pray that they knew—that merely being a classified person or the situation being classified did not

fulfill the elements required by the Agent Identities Protection Act?

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you very much.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Toensing follows:]

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Chairman WAXMAN. I want to recognize Mr. Davis to start off.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Thank you. We didn’t start with going

into the covert—taking Ms. Plame at her word——

Ms. TOENSING. I am having a hard time hearing you.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. We didn’t go into extensively whether it

was covert or not. I asked her whether anybody told her she was

versus what she thought. But the question was—clearly, there

were no crimes committed.

I’m going to ask each of you, can you name a leak case that you

have dealt with that has undergone more scrutiny or investigation

than this one? Mr. Zaid.

Mr. ZAID. Not as much. Certainly nothing as public as this.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Either with grand jury.

Mr. ZAID. There are numerous grand juries, even ones that are

going on right now with leak investigations, and they haven’t received the amount of publicity that this case has.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. They have a special prosecutor on this

and you can look at the hours of testimony. This has undergone as

much scrutiny as any case you are aware of.

Mr. ZAID. Sure.

Ms. TOENSING. I used to tell Chairman Goldwater—he’d say, I

want those leakers—in much more crusty language than that—I

want those leakers prosecuted, and I would say, ‘‘It’s the rule of 38.

If 38 people knew about it, you are probably not going to get a

prosecution,’’ and so usually there is not a prosecution in the case.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. I mean, the thing that strikes me

through all of this is if the CIA fails to take affirmative steps to

protect their own agents, how can you expect the recipients of information to know that the information is protected and take appropriate precautions? Mr. Zaid—I’ll ask you both.

Ms. TOENSING. I mean, the whole reason that we put that into

the law was because we didn’t want employees to be chilled from

reporting wrongdoing, that the person had to know, have knowledge that the CIA was taking these affirmative measures to protect

the identity and the relationship of that person. So if nobody is telling anybody, it is like, who knew? How would you know that something was not to be repeated?

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. The majority is pointing the finger at the

White House, but the leak didn’t come from the White House. And,

second, there is no evidence—presented here today at least—that

anybody in the White House knew that she was a covert agent.

Ms. TOENSING. Not one person told anybody in the White House.

We have no evidence.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Let me——

Chairman WAXMAN. Excuse me. You are saying that conclusively. Do you know the facts? Or are you just saying there is no

evidence?

Ms. TOENSING. I know what facts are out there. If somebody

wants to point to another fact, I will be glad to listen.

Chairman WAXMAN. So what you have heard, you can reach that

conclusion from. You don’t know all of the information.

Ms. TOENSING. From the testimony at trial.

Mr. ZAID. I think we have to make a distinction between criminality and what type of administrative sanctions could possibly

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have been imposed. I have no personal information with respect to

this case, other than what everybody else does in reviewing it with

great interest, especially since it’s in my subject matter knowledge.

And Ms. Toensing is absolutely correct with many of her questions with respect to the Intelligence Identities Act, which has a

very exacting standard. Ms. Plame, as she indicated, was covert.

That is a distinction between possibly under the Intelligence Identities Act and that classified information was leaked and then the

question then is of a criminal magnitude versus something less

than that. And those could be any number of penalties.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. But if you don’t know she’s undercover,

it is hard to put a penalty on somebody.

Mr. ZAID. That would be something like the previous witness,

where his office would have to investigate to see how the leak came

about.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. There is no question this should never

be leaked. We should never ‘‘out’’ any undercover operative. I don’t

think anyone here can condone that in any way, shape, or form.

The difficulty I am having, though, is we are focused today just

on the White House. The CIA bears some responsibility.

Ms. Plame’s own testimony today talked about they knew the

story was coming, and she did the appropriate thing in reporting

to her superiors that the story was coming, a story that could end

her career. And what did her bosses do? They obviously didn’t persuade Mr. Novak, but the question is, did they send their A Team

up there to talk to Mr. Novak? Did they let them know that an

agent could be outed? That is the question.

Ms. Toensing, what is contemplated under a statute in a case

like that?

Ms. TOENSING. The statute has very high standards. This is almost impossible for a journalist to be indicted under, just a regular

working journalist, not somebody who has a specific intent.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. No journalist in their right mind would

do this on purpose.

Ms. TOENSING. But an employee would have to be aware that the

agency is taking affirmative measures to protect or conceal this

person’s relationship to the United States. If nobody even told the

people who were being briefed—I mean, the State Department

didn’t know. Dick Armitage didn’t know.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. But the question is, once it gets to the

press level, say someone inadvertently leaked this to the press,

what should the CIA do? And notwithstanding the act, from a policy perspective, what should the CIA do or be able to do to protect

their operatives and what do you think they should do in this case?

Ms. TOENSING. They didn’t do anything in this case. To anybody

looking at it from—as I view it, as I see all of the facts, I have no

reason whatsoever to believe that Ms. Plame was covert under the

statute.

I mean, they can call—I have represented a covert officer. It is

not an agent, actually. The statute uses that term, but Ms. Plame

was a covert officer. I have represented a covert officer from the

CIA; and let me tell you, in the course of my representation, the

New York Times was going to print her name on its front page.

And the New York Times reporter, a wonderful reporter, Tim

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Weiner, called me and said the CIA just called him and told him

that they were going to go after him criminally if they printed her

name. No such threat was ever given to Bob Novak. And good for

Tim Weiner. He went ahead and printed it anyway.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Let me ask this. So the statute at this

point gives press almost an immunity on those kinds of issues once

they learn about it. Is that your reading of the law?

Ms. TOENSING. Yes.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. What should the CIA have done in this

case if they wanted to protect an operative?

Ms. TOENSING. If this is a very big deal to the CIA, they should

have brought in the DCI, at least the Deputy, and come in with

Bob Novak and had a talk and say, ‘‘You cannot print this name.

This would just be terrible. This is national security.’’

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Let me ask you, from a policy perspective, notwithstanding where the law is today, that sets a very high

standard for the press. What should we do—in future cases, what

should the CIA do once—if you are going to have an operative

outed, a top-secret memo that could damage national security, how

should that be handled from a policy perspective?

Mr. ZAID. I wouldn’t in any way divert blame from the CIA in

this matter. There are many steps they could have taken, and Ms.

Toensing has identified them, and it wouldn’t have been the first

time where a very senior official in the CIA would go to a member

of the press.

I often represent covert officers. I mean, routinely. And I know

the precautions that they try to impose on me, which I follow to

protect them. Because if their identities are released it does put

their lives in jeopardy; and, even more importantly, because when

they are usually back here in the United States it puts everyone

they ever had any contact with in their lives in jeopardy as well

as operations.

I don’t know why the CIA didn’t do more. That is a good question. The CIA should be here to explain that.

Again, I would make a distinction between that we not only look

at the criminality of this but we also look at the administrative disciplines that should have been meted out.

I had a client that was disciplined because he was acting as a

courier with classified information and he left the bag locked up in

his locked car while he went into McDonald’s to get a burger with

the car in sight. That was the violation. It took me a year to get

his clearance back.

So the agencies will take it seriously when they wish to.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Thank you.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you very much, Mr. Davis.

I have questions, but I don’t know whether I want to go into all

of the time to ask questions.

But I am stunned, Ms. Toensing, that you would come here with

absolute conclusions she was not a covert agent. The White House

did not leak it. No one seemed to know in advance that she was

a CIA agent. Do you know those facts from your own first-hand

knowledge?

Ms. TOENSING. Well, let us take those one by one. As I said, I

was there. I was the chief——

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Chairman WAXMAN. I am not asking for your credentials. I am

asking for how you reached those conclusions.

Ms. TOENSING. That’s part of her credentials, because I know

what the intent of the act was.

Chairman WAXMAN. I am not asking what the intent of the act

was. Do you know she was not a covert agent?

Ms. TOENSING. She is not a covert agent under the act. You can

call her anything you want to in the halls of the CIA.

Chairman WAXMAN. General Hayden, the head of the CIA, told

me personally that she was—if I said that she was a covert agent,

it wasn’t an incorrect statement.

Ms. TOENSING. Does he want to swear that she was a covert

agent under the act?

Chairman WAXMAN. I am trying to say this as carefully as I can.

He reviewed my statement, and my statement was she was a covert agent.

Ms. TOENSING. He didn’t say under the act.

Chairman WAXMAN. OK. So you’re trying to define it exactly

under the act.

Ms. TOENSING. That’s what——

Chairman WAXMAN. No, no, no, no, no. I am not giving you—I

am not yielding my time to you.

So that is your interpretation. Do you know that the White

House—no one in the White House leaked this information?

Ms. TOENSING. Well, I don’t know even know how to deal with

the word ‘‘leak’’ here. I know that people in the White House——

Chairman WAXMAN. Well, Karl Rove admitted he leaked it. Do

you think he is not telling us the truth?

Ms. TOENSING. Well, the words are important, and I’m not sure

what——

Chairman WAXMAN. So you want to completely define the words

that are so narrow in meaning that your statements can be credible but not honest. I am not asking about the statute. I am not

asking about the statute. Evidently, if there were a criminal violation, the Special Inspector General investigating this matter might

have brought criminal actions. Put that aside. Karl Rove said he

leaked the information. Do you think he did not?

Ms. TOENSING. Let me give you an example.

Chairman WAXMAN. I want a yes or no. I am asking you a direct

question that could be answered yes or no.

Ms. TOENSING. Well, it can’t, but I will answer no then and

explain——

Chairman WAXMAN. Do you have first-hand information that

none of the people at the White House had knowledge that she was

a covert agent?

Ms. TOENSING. There has no been no testimony. I can only go by

that.

Chairman WAXMAN. You stated it so affirmatively and conclusively that I thought maybe you had access to information that we

didn’t have.

Ms. TOENSING. I have information to the testimony, and so because I know what the testimony is, that everybody—and I am

sure that the Special Counsel would have brought in anybody who

had anything to do with it in the trial——

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Chairman WAXMAN. Maybe he would have. We thought the

White House would have investigated the matter, and they didn’t.

Mr. Zaid, in your experience with these kinds of cases, do agencies wait until a criminal investigation is complete before taking

any action or do they sometimes say, while this is pending, we are

going to take away the security clearance?

Mr. ZAID. They do not wait, Mr. Chairman. There is no requirement that they wait. I could understand in some cases there could

be a need for coordination. But very often, in my experience, by the

time you got into a criminal matter, the employee or contractor

clearance has already been suspended.

Chairman WAXMAN. And if an agency’s goal is to prevent additional security violations and protect classified information, doesn’t

it make sense for the agency to do something right away rather

than wait as long as 3 years?

I mean, this is 3 years now that the same people in the White

House have had classified information given to them, even though

they have already admitted in most cases that they disclosed that

information.

I don’t think they should—does it seem right to you that they

would wait until not only the investigation is complete but all of

the prosecution has been handled?

Mr. ZAID. I find it very disconcerting and inconsistent with what

I have seen at other agencies. I have seen far less of a grave situation or clearance infraction that has been addressed far more

quickly by an agency.

Again, I don’t know personally besides what we all know, most

part, publicly from what transpired, but from an administrative

standpoint I am very surprised that something has not been done.

If it were one of my clients, I am sure something would have been

done.

Chairman WAXMAN. I am not sure if you are familiar with all of

the administrative activities. You are knowledgeable about the law,

whether it’s a criminal violation, but, in your experience, do you

know whether agencies will sometimes suspend people’s security

clearances while there is an investigation going on?

Ms. TOENSING. Some do and some don’t. It would depend on—as

was said by the panel before on a case-by-case basis because—and

here, if I were the lawyer for a person making the decision whether

to do so, I would really want the decisionmaker to weigh whether

it would appear to be obstruction of justice. If you start calling in

witnesses and you start interviewing the witnesses and you’re not

part of the Justice Department——

Chairman WAXMAN. That would go to an investigation where you

could simply say there is an investigation going on in the meantime. I think it’s more prudent not to allow you to get more classified information. That’s done frequently.

Ms. TOENSING. I didn’t understand what your question was.

Chairman WAXMAN. Rather than do a whole investigation that

might put somebody in a situation where they got two investigations going on and so they’re represented in the investigation-type

case, but, in the meantime, we will suspend your access to classified information.

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Ms. TOENSING. That sometimes happens. It depends on what the

violation is. It can happen. It cannot happen as Mr.——

Chairman WAXMAN. It’s not unheard of. Thank you.

Mr. Cummings.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

I was sitting here listening to this, and it’s just something I

think is incredible to me, and I think we are losing sight of what

went on here.

We had an American who simply wanted to serve her country,

who put her life, her life, on the line. And I don’t know what Goldwater—what he was doing, you know. But one thing I do know is

that we had a lady here who lost her job, lost the opportunity to

carry out the things that she apparently wanted to do, it was her

love, while risking her life. And out of all of this testimony I hope

we don’t lose sight of that.

There is a reason why we have these rules, these laws and these

Executive orders; and those reasons basically go to trying to protect

people, Americans, who want to go out there and protect us and try

to make sure that they are not harmed.

Were you here, Ms. Toensing, when Ms. Valerie Plame testified?

Ms. TOENSING. Yes, I was.

Mr. CUMMINGS. One of the things that she said—she said two

things that I know will be embedded in the DNA of every cell of

my body until I die. She said, I did not—I expected other countries

to try to reveal my identity, but never did I expect my own government to do it. And then she said something else that was very interesting. She said that, as a result of the disclosure, whole networks of agents have been placed in jeopardy.

The reason why I say that is because it seems like to me all of

us, as Americans, would want to make sure that we did every single thing in our power to protect those people who are going out

there trying to protect us.

Going back to the—you know, we have a situation here, too,

where, you know, it wasn’t just the law, it was the order, 12958,

the President’s order. And unlike the criminal statute which requires an intentional disclosure of classified information, the administrative rules prohibit not just intentional disclosures but reckless and negligent ones as well, isn’t that correct?

Ms. TOENSING. You are reading from it. I assume that you read

it appropriately.

Can I say a word in reaction to that? I have no problem. I have

no problem with Ms. Plame. I respect the service that she contributed to this country.

My complaint is two-fold, one against the CIA for not taking the

proper precautions, as they had promised to do so when this act

was passed in the 1980’s; and, second, with the application. Because I am a criminal defense lawyer, but I was also a prosecutor,

and I don’t like to see the law abused. I don’t like the application

of the criminal law to a situation that does not have the elements

of it. I think that is an abuse of prosecutorial power.

Mr. CUMMINGS. I was a criminal lawyer, too. And, you know, I

am sure that, consistent with what you just said, you believed the

testimony should be accurate, did you not? That seems consistent

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with what you just said, that you would want anybody’s testimony

to be accurate. Wouldn’t that be correct?

Ms. TOENSING. That is correct.

Mr. CUMMINGS. I think you said a little earlier that she had not

been out of the country for 5 years. Didn’t you say that?

Ms. TOENSING. No, the statute doesn’t say that. It says for an assignment.

Mr. CUMMINGS. No, what did you say?

Ms. TOENSING. I said for an assignment. I didn’t testify about

that here today, here yet.

Mr. CUMMINGS. I thought I read it in something that you said

to the press at some point. You didn’t say that?

Ms. TOENSING. I have always used the term ‘‘under the statute.’’

Mr. CUMMINGS. It says here, Washington Post, February 18th,

just prior to the start of deliberations of the jury in the Scooter

Libby trial, and you said this as follows—it may be wrong. The

Washington Post can check it out—but it says, ‘‘Plame was not covert,’’ and you said that, today, ‘‘She worked at the CIA headquarters and had not been stationed abroad within 5 years of the

date of Novak’s column.’’

Ms. TOENSING. Right. That’s the same concept as serving outside

the United States. That was the whole concept that we had when

we passed the law.

The first draft of the law—and I have it in my statement—was

we only applied it to persons who are outside of the United States.

We never applied it to anybody inside the United States. And then

people wanted rotation people covered. The CIA said, you got to

cover rotation people. So we said, how long is that? They said, 2

to 3 years. We said, OK, we’ll change it.

‘‘Or within 3 years of coming back to the United States.’’

And then somebody said, oh, but people retire; and so we said,

OK, CIA, how long do you need to protect those sources that the

person had while serving abroad? And they told us 5 years. So

that’s why we have the 5-year requirement. But it was always intended, because of the assassinations abroad, to protect our personnel serving abroad.

Mr. CUMMINGS. I see my time is up. Thank you very much.

Ms. TOENSING. Inside the United States.

Chairman WAXMAN. I wanted to be very clear for the record. I

said earlier General Hayden and the CIA have cleared the following comments: During her employment at the CIA, Ms. Wilson was

undercover. Her employment status with the CIA was classified information prohibited from disclosure under the Executive Order

12958. And at the time of the publication of Robert Novak’s column

on July 14, 2003, Ms. Wilson’s CIA employment status was covert.

This was classified information.

So I wanted to repeat it. I don’t know if I misstated it or not.

But let no one misunderstand it, and I would just use those words

so we can clarify it for the record.

Ms. Watson.

Ms. WATSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I want to kind of pursue this line of questioning, Ms. Toensing,

as well.

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It is reported, again, by the Washington Post on February 18,

2007, that you said, I am going to read it. It was just read. ‘‘Plame

was not covert. She worked at CIA headquarters and had not been

stationed abroad within 5 years of the date of Novak’s column.’’

You said you were here, and you heard Ms. Wilson’s testimony.

I took notes on her testimony, and I quoted her. She said she was

a covert agent, and that was her statement.

Now it seems to me that your remarks are contrary to that statement. So do you still maintain that on February 18, 2007, Ms. Wilson was not a covert CIA agent?

Ms. TOENSING. Not under the law. She didn’t say she was under

the law. In fact, she said several times that she was not a lawyer.

I know what the law requires——

Ms. WATSON. Reclaiming my time.

You said—this is your statement from that date: ‘‘Plame was not

covert.’’ And my question directly is, do you still maintain that on

that date she was not a covert CIA officer?

Ms. TOENSING. I was trying to answer. Yes, I still maintain that.

Ms. WATSON. Yes or no.

Ms. TOENSING. I still maintain it, yes.

Ms. WATSON. That she was not a covert agent.

Ms. TOENSING. Under the law. Completely.

Ms. WATSON. Ms. Plame was sworn.

Ms. TOENSING. And I am sworn. I am giving you my legal interpretation under the law as I know the law, and I helped draft the

law. The person is supposed to reside outside of the United States.

And let me make one other comment——

Ms. WATSON. No. Reclaiming my time—because this is being

timed and Members do have to leave—did you receive any information directly from the CIA or Ms. Wilson that supports your assertion that Ms. Wilson was not a covert officer?

Ms. TOENSING. I didn’t talk to Ms. Wilson or the CIA.

Ms. WATSON. And do you have any information about the nature

of Ms. Wilson’s employment status that Director Hayden and Ms.

Wilson don’t have?

Ms. TOENSING. I have no idea—I don’t know what he has that

I don’t have. You know, vice versa. I can just tell you what is required under the law. They can call anybody anything they want

to do in the halls, but, under this statute, a criminal statute which

is interpreted very strictly, all of these elements have to be proven

beyond a reasonable doubt. That has been my concern.

Ms. WATSON. Your testimony is focusing on the criminal prohibition in the Intelligence Identities Protection Act. But I don’t see

any mention whatsoever of the administrative restrictions contained in Executive Order 12958, which is what the invitation letter asks you to address.

As you note in your written statement—and we have copies of

it—there are numerous elements that must be proven beyond a

reasonable doubt in order to establish a crime under the IIPA.

In contrast, the administrative rules simply prohibit the disclosure of classified information to anyone not authorized to receive

it. Unlike the criminal statute, which requires an intentional disclosure of classified information, the administrative rules prohibit

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not just intentional disclosures but reckless and negligent ones as

well. Is that right?

Ms. TOENSING. Of course.

Ms. WATSON. OK. Therefore, an improper disclosure of classified

information violates the Executive order, even though it does not

violate the criminal statute; is that right?

Ms. TOENSING. I am just——

Ms. WATSON. Is that right?

Ms. TOENSING. I wasn’t invited here to talk about——

Ms. WATSON. Excuse me. Reclaiming my time. Reclaiming my

time. Is that right? Yes or no.

Ms. TOENSING. Would you repeat it, please?

Ms. WATSON. I will. Therefore, an improper disclosure of classified information violates the Executive order, even though it does

not violate the criminal statute. Yes or no.

Ms. TOENSING. I take no issue with that. Yeah, that is right.

Chairman WAXMAN. Thank you, Ms. Watson. Your time has expired.

Mr. Van Hollen.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me thank both

of our witnesses here today.

Ms. Toensing, let me ask you, getting back to the overall context

in which this all happened, wouldn’t you agree that the reason the

White House official disclosed this information, leaked it quietly to

the press, was in an effort to discredit somehow Ambassador Wilson as a result of the article he wrote in the New York Times?

Ms. TOENSING. I have no idea why they gave out that information. I do know that there was this allusion by Joe Wilson that he

was sent on the trip by the Vice President’s office. So it made sense

to me, if you are sitting in the Vice President’s office, to say, ‘‘We

didn’t send him. We didn’t know what this is all about.’’ And in the

inquiry, as I understand it, and you may have different facts, the

response was his wife sent him. And guess who did that? The INR

statement at the State Department.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Do you know why Mr. Rove, after disclosing

some of this information to Mr. Cooper at Time Magazine, would

have concluded by saying I have already said too much?

Ms. TOENSING. I have no idea.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. It seems to me that kind of statement—of

course, we can’t all read Mr. Rove’s mind, but an ordinary interpretation of that may be to conclude that he already provided him information that he knew he shouldn’t be providing.

Let me just go back to the other statements made by the White

House. We saw the clip here of their spokesman, Scott McClellan,

stating that the White House had not been involved in the disclosure of Valerie Plame as somebody who worked at the CIA. Now

you agree she worked at the CIA, right?

Ms. TOENSING. Yeah. I didn’t hear that statement, but that’s OK.

If you are going to say he said those words—I thought he said in

giving off classified information, but——

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. My understanding is what they were essentially saying, they were not involved in the disclosures that had

been made and, clearly, the testimonies that were involved in the

disclosures that had been made.

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Let me get back to, as I said, the purpose of the hearing. Part

of the purpose of the hearing was to look at how the White House

safeguards security information. That is the reason we had the second panel. And did you know before the testimony today that the

White House itself had not undertaken any kind of investigation

internally from the security office?

Ms. TOENSING. I didn’t know that, but I would have concurred

with that with a massive criminal investigation going on. If I was

a lawyer to the President, I would say don’t you dare do a thing

until this criminal investigation and prosecution is over.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. It was more than 2 months after this initially

broke that Scott McClellan in another statement said, we have no

information in the White House about any of these disclosures. Before you made that kind of statement, wouldn’t you undertake

some kind of investigation?

Ms. TOENSING. Well, I am not here to answer for Scott McClellan.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. There is one issue that has to do with once the

criminal investigation was started, but a long period of time went

by when no administrative action was taken, and, as I understand

your response to the question by Ms. Watson, you would agree that

kind of sort of investigation goes on routinely when there has been

a disclosure of classified information, does it not?

Ms. TOENSING. It can, and it cannot. I mean, I certainly wouldn’t

have done it in the brouhaha that occurred within a week of Bob

Novak’s publication.

By the way, Bob Novak was not the first person to say she was

covert. That was David Corn who printed that she was covert. Bob

Novak called her an operative.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. This is a period of 2 months when there was

lots of questions, everyone was trying to find out what was going

on. The CIA had said that this was an unauthorized disclosure.

The President of the United States said, ‘‘this is a very serious

matter, and our administration takes it seriously.’’

Do you agree this was a serious matter?

Ms. TOENSING. Well, I think an outing, if somebody’s career is

being affected, is, of course, a serious matter. The issue is whether

it was—the outing was done intentionally under the criminal law.

That is what I have written about always.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. I understand. I understand your point under

the criminal law.

The other question, though, is why people didn’t take action

under the non-criminal law as part of safeguarding secrets at the

White House. And I understand your focus is on the other issue,

but I have to say it is stunning that the White House would tell

us they had no information about this 2 months after the first disclosures and we hear today that they never conducted any investigation. I mean——

Ms. TOENSING. I would agree with you that it was a bad situation that happened. But I say shame on the CIA, that the briefer

did not tell anybody at the White House that——

Chairman WAXMAN. How do you know that? How do you know?

Ms. TOENSING. He testified to that at the Scooter Libby trial.

Chairman WAXMAN. Who was that briefer?

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Ms. TOENSING. Grenier. Robert Grenier.

Chairman WAXMAN. And he was the briefer from the CIA?

Ms. TOENSING. He said, I talked about Valerie Plame. I talked

about the wife with Scooter Libby and the Vice President, but I

didn’t tell them that—this was on cross-examination. He admitted

that he had not said that her status was either classified or covert.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. If I could, Mr. Chairman. Do you think White

House officials have any obligation at all to put aside the legal obligation as stewards of our national security when they find out that

someone works for the Central Intelligence Agency? Do you think

they have any obligation to citizens of this country to find out, before telling the President about it, whether that disclosure would

compromise sensitive information? Do you think—as just citizens of

this country, wouldn’t you want that to be the standard?

Ms. TOENSING. I think the Press Secretary should always tell

what is accurate. The Press Secretary should always tell what is

accurate. I have no problem with that.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Before somebody goes around saying this person works for the CIA in a cavalier manner—obviously, intentional

manner to try to spread this information, don’t you think they have

an obligation to the citizens of this country to make—we are talking about the Iraq war, decisions for going to war, whether or not

Saddam Hussein was trying to get nuclear weapons material. Before they disclosed the identity of somebody who works in the nuclear nonproliferation area of the CIA, don’t you think they have

some obligation for—and to demonstrate the good judgment to find

out if that would disclose sensitive information? That is my question.

Ms. TOENSING. Well, it could be, but I don’t particularly think

that a red flag would go off. Because those of us who work in government all the time know people who work at the CIA and talk

with people who are at the CIA, so you wouldn’t necessarily

say——

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. We don’t all of us go around trying to use that

information with reporters for the purpose of discrediting somebody.

Ms. TOENSING. Let me say—do you want me to tell you my experience? Because, as Mark has represented, people who are covert—

and I have asked them since all of this occurred, well, would you

ever have a desk job at being covert at Langley? And they laugh

at me. You know—I don’t know. I have never been covert. I have

represented people, and this is what they tell me.

Chairman WAXMAN. The gentleman’s time has expired.

I want to thank both of you.

Mr. Zaid, I had other questions for you. Let me ask you one

quick one.

If you had clients like Fleischer and Martin and Libby and Cheney and Rove, let’s say they were worried because they disclosed

information that they shouldn’t have disclosed, wouldn’t you tell

them that they were treated a lot better than most people who disclosed classified information?

Mr. ZAID. They are treated a lot better than many of my clients,

some of whom who have testified before you like Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer, who did lose his security clearance and his job

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at the Defense Intelligence Agency for incurring $67 in cellular

phone bills and a couple of other petty issues like stealing pens

from the U.S. Embassy when he was 14 years old 30 years ago. So,

yes, I would say there is quite a number of people who have fared

a great deal better than many of my clients. But if they want to

hire me—I represent Republicans and Democrats—I don’t have any

problem.

Chairman WAXMAN. As you should.

Ms. TOENSING. Me, too.

Chairman WAXMAN. Their double standard doesn’t make any difference. You are counsel, and everything is entitled to representation.

I want to thank you both for being here. Ms. Toensing, I have

the pleasure to say we are pleased to accommodate the request of

the minority to have you as a witness. Some of the statements you

have made, without any doubt with great authority, I understand

may not be accurate, so we are going to check the information and

we are going to hold the record open to put in other things that

might contradict some of what you had to say.

The only thing I will say is that when we heard from Mrs. Wilson and we have heard from Fitzgerald and I talked personally to

General Hayden, they have a different view as to what is a protected agent than you do; and your knowledge is knowledge is

based on writing the law 30 years ago.

Ms. TOENSING. Don’t date me that far. It was 25.

Chairman WAXMAN. Well, we will check that fact out, also. But

if I am incorrect, my apologies.

The committee stands adjourned.

[Whereupon, at 2:30 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]

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