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recent days there has been some criticism of White House press secretary
Ari Fleischer for his refusal to say whether there were more communications
between the administration and Enron than have been so far been
disclosed. But yesterday President Bush left little doubt that Fleischer
is simply expressing the president's desire that there be no further
revelations about Enron.
Answering questions
as he toured a machinery company in Belle, West Virginia, the president
— while not saying so directly — seemed to suggest that
the White House has already disclosed all its contacts with Enron.
"Our administration has done the exact right thing," he
said. "There's been a couple of contacts with people in my
Cabinet. And my Cabinet officers said, no help here....I'm absolutely
confident the American people know that my administration has acted
the right way."
The president
also seemed to endorse — again, indirectly — Fleischer's
position that reporters must first come up with specific allegations
of misconduct before the White House will examine its contacts with
Enron. "If somebody has got an accusation about some wrongdoing,
just let me know," the president said. "It's like when
I talked with Don Evans and [Treasury Secretary Paul] O'Neill, they
told me they had spoken to Enron. I said, tell the people what you
did."
On the same
trip, however, Fleischer said there may have been more contacts
between the White House and Enron, although not contacts that concerned
the company's descent into bankruptcy. "I've done my best to
answer questions about any contacts with Enron about Enron's financial
condition or anything of that nature," Fleischer said. "I've
always said there may be contacts with Enron about other topics."
A reporter
asked if that meant there were no additional contacts regarding
Enron's financial situation. "That's right," Fleischer
said. "None that I've been made aware of."
Although Fleischer
took care to add the qualification "that I've been made aware
of," he also repeated earlier statements that the White House
is not trying to find out if there were any more dealings with Enron
in the company's last days. That appears to reflect a belief on
the part of the president's advisers that if there are more undisclosed
administration/Enron contacts, and if they support the basic story
that the White House did no special favors for Enron, revealing
them piecemeal would be less damaging than facing headlines like
"White House Launches Internal Investigation." So, at
least for now, the White House will continue to assert that there
were no additional contacts even as it steadfastly avoids discovering
whether any in fact exist.
Meanwhile,
on Capitol Hill, the return of Congress today will likely change
the dynamic of the situation for the administration. For the moment,
the Republican-controlled House and Democratic-controlled Senate
are focusing their investigations on wrongdoing inside Enron —
an enormous topic that seems to grow larger with each day's revelations.
But it is possible that at some point Democrats in the Senate will
turn their attention to the White House and its dealings with the
company.
Republican
sources say there is no real nervousness among GOP senators about
contacts between the administration and Enron — that's an issue
that so far seems confined to question-and-answer sessions between
reporters and Fleischer. But there is growing uneasiness on Capitol
Hill about Vice President Dick Cheney's refusal to reveal the outside
contacts of his energy task force.
For more than
nine months, Cheney has been locked in a dispute with the General
Accounting Office over those outside consultations. The vice president
believes he took care to abide by the law governing advisory commissions
like the energy task force and is therefore not required to reveal
the names of outsiders who were consulted during the drafting of
the national energy policy. Further, Cheney believes the GAO does
not have the legal authority to force him to hand over the names.
Finally, Cheney believes that revealing the names would have a chilling
effect on future government consultations, with outside experts
becoming less willing to give candid advice for fear that it would
be made public.
The issue is
likely headed to court, since the GAO is expected to sue Cheney
any day now. And as it goes on, Senate Republicans are watching
anxiously. "It looks like they have something to hide,"
says a Senate GOP leadership aide. Furthermore, the aide concedes,
it is difficult to imagine lawmakers rushing to the cameras to proclaim,
"I support the vice president's right to keep the names secret.
He shouldn't have to make them public." If the situation ever
arises in which Cheney needs Republican support for his secrecy
policy, he probably won't get it.
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