Russert contradicts Libby in trial
The Washington Times
www.washingtontimes.com
ASSOCIATED PRESS
NBC newsman Tim Russert testified yesterday
he never discussed a CIA operative with former vice presidential aide
I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby Jr., contradicting Mr. Libby’s version to a
grand jury in the CIA leak investigation.
The testimony came as prosecutors prepared
to rest their perjury case against Vice President Dick Cheney’s former
chief of staff.
Mr. Russert, host of “Meet the Press,”
testified about a July 2003 phone call in which Mr. Libby complained
about a colleague’s coverage. Mr. Libby has said that, at the end of
the call, Mr. Russert brought up war critic Joseph C. Wilson IV and
mentioned that the former ambassador’s wife worked for the CIA.
“That would be impossible,” Mr. Russert
testified yesterday . “I didn’t know who that person was until several
days later.”
That discrepancy is at the heart of Mr.
Libby’s perjury and obstruction trial. He is accused of lying to
investigators about his conversations with reporters regarding former
CIA operative Valerie Plame.
During Mr. Libby’s 2004 grand jury
testimony, he said Mr. Russert told him “all the reporters know” that
Mr. Wilson’s wife worked at the CIA. Mr. Libby now acknowledges he had
learned about Mrs. Plame a month earlier from Mr. Cheney but says he
had forgotten about it and learned it again from Mr. Russert as if new.
Mr. Libby subsequently repeated the
information about Mrs. Plame to other journalists, always with the
caveat that he had heard it from reporters, he has said. Prosecutors
say Mr. Libby concocted the Mr. Russert conversation to shield him from
prosecution for revealing information from government sources.
Mrs. Plame’s identity was leaked shortly
after her husband began accusing the Bush administration of doctoring
prewar intelligence on Iraq. The controversy over the faulty
intelligence was a major story in mid-2003.
Given that climate, defense attorney Theodore Wells was skeptical about Mr. Russert’s account.
“You have the chief of staff of the vice
president of the United States on the telephone and you don’t ask him
one question about it?” Mr. Wells asked. He followed up moments later
with, “As a newsperson who’s known for being aggressive and going after
the facts, you wouldn’t have asked him about the biggest stories in the
world that week?”
“What happened is exactly what I told you,” Mr. Russert replied.
Mr. Russert originally told the FBI that he
couldn’t rule out discussing Mr. Wilson with Mr. Libby but had no
recollection of it, according to an FBI report Mr. Wells read in court.
Mr. Russert said yesterday he did not think he said that.
Special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald
has spent weeks making the case that Mr. Libby was preoccupied with
discrediting Mr. Wilson. Several former White House, CIA and State
Department officials testified that Mr. Libby discussed Mrs. Plame with
them — all before the Russert conversation.
Mr. Fitzgerald has said Mr. Russert would be his final witness.
::Tullycast:: 
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