Defending Enron Secrecy
The White House still won’t answer questions.

January 23, 2002 9:35 a.m.

n 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.