Former President Clinton and former Vice President Gore have declined an invitation by the Independent Commission Investigating the 9/11 Attacks to testify in public, after reportedly agreeing to do so earlier this month, and instead will be interviewed privately.
Only last week, the former president and vice president had agreed to testify publicy, with the Associated Press reporting on March 2, "Clinton and Gore have consented to public questioning without a time constraint."
By contrast, the AP said that President Bush and Vice President Cheney "have agreed only to private, separate, one-hour meetings with the commission's chairman and vice chairman, instead of the full panel."
Both President Bush and ex-President Clinton were initially invited to give public testimony on what they knew about the 9/11 attacks. But the White House made it clear from the outset that testimony from Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney would be given in private.
In the week since the AP said they would testify in public, representatives for both Clinton and Gore have insisted that their interviews would be conducted behind closed doors instead.
Despite the apparent reversal, the press has focused on the Bush White House, with reporters complaining about the one-hour time limit placed on the 9/11 session by the White House.
However, after Tuesday's announcement that Bush would answer any and all questions posed by the 9/11 Commission regardless of how long it took, complaints have shifted to the White House's decision to meet only with the panel's chairman, Tom Kean, and vice chair, Lee Hamilton.
White House concerns are said to center on two of the commission's more partisan members, Democrat attack dog Richard Ben-Veniste (a former lawyer for DNC chairman Terry McAuliffe) and Jamie Gorelick, who during her stint as deputy attorney general was described in published reports as "Hillary Clinton's eyes and ears at the Justice Department."
In May 2002, Sen. Clinton publicly charged that President Bush covered up evidence of a CIA warning that could have prevented the 9/11 attacks.
Another White House worry: a memo circulated among Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee last November outlining plans to use sensitive national security material to undermine Bush's re-election.
The development raised concerns that sensitive intelligence shared with the 9/11 Commission could be leaked in a bid for partisan advantage, even if it meant compromising the war on terror.
While 9/11 Commission members have pressed to have Bush National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice to testify publicly, going so far as threatening to subpoena her, panel members have expressed no complaint about the Clinton-Gore decision to keep their accounts private.
While ex-presidents have given testimony to congressional probers in the past, even President Bush's limited private grilling would be unprecedented in U.S. history.
"Outside of a legal investigation, I cannot recall any sitting president meeting with an investigative body of this kind," said University of Virginia history professor Philip Zelikow, the commission's executive director, in an interview with the Washington Post. "It is highly unusual," he added.
Even during the Warren Commission's probe into the assassination of President Kennedy, for instance, then-President Johnson was allowed to submit a three-page statement detailing his account, but was not required to answer any questions.
Still, a leading Democrat on the 9/11 Commission, former Rep. Tim Roemer, suggested it would be wrong to make any special accommodations for a sitting president, telling the New York Times last week, "It's very important that we treat both the Bush and the Clinton administrations the same."
Editor's note:
"CATASTROPHE" Reveals the Secret Story Behind 9/11
Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:
Bush Administration
War on Terrorism
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