President Obama yesterday insisted the White House wasn’t behind national security leaks that wound up in flattering news stories.
Stung by criticism that his aides were dishing secrets to The New York Times and other media to bolster his re-election campaign, Obama said he’d investigate.
“In some cases, these are criminal acts,” he said at the White House. “We have mechanisms in place where if we can root out folks who have leaked, they will suffer consequences.”
The outrage over a glut of leaks focuses on a detailed Times article that laid out the process by which he decides which al Qaeda operatives to target in a “kill list.”
“The notion that my White House would purposely release classified national security information is offensive,” Obama said. “It’s wrong.”
A memo from the Senate Republican Policy Committee said either Obama or the Times was misleading the public.
It noted that the “kill list” story said “three dozen” of the president’s “current and former advisers were interview sources for the story.”
“It would appear the president’s statement and The New York Times statements directly conflict with each other and cannot both be true at the same time,” the memo said.
The Democratic and Republican chiefs of the Senate and House intelligence committees denounced the leaks this week and said they were drafting legislation to limit access to top national secrets. The FBI said it was launching its own investigation.
Later yesterday, Attorney General Eric Holder announced that he has assigned two US attorneys to lead criminal investigations into the allegations of unauthorized leaks: the US attorney for the District of Columbia Ronald C. Machen Jr. and US attorney for the District of Maryland Rod J. Rosenstein.
“These two highly respected and experienced prosecutors will be directing separate investigations currently being conducted by the FBI,” he said.
Holder said they are authorized to “consult with members of the Intelligence Community and follow all appropriate investigative leads within the executive and legislative branches of government.”
House Intelligence Committee chairman Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.), said his committee would formally investigate the leaks, but said he was concerned about the level of cooperation he would get.
“Just today, the CIA informed the [committee] that it cannot respond to our request for information regarding the leaks, a very troubling event indeed,” Rogers said.