Bill Clinton: "They've Gotten Away With MURDER."

July 26th, 2005 3:51 pm
Portions of Press Briefing by Scott McClellan

WhiteHouse.gov
1:16 P.M. EDT
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Go ahead, April.

Q Scott, on another topic, former President Bill Clinton spoke to the "Today Show" recently and he basically called the CIA leak issue terrible. And he said, "Rove is a brilliant political strategist and he's proved brilliantly effective at destroying Democrats, personally." He says, "I mean they've gotten away with murder and he's really good at it. He's good at playing psychological head games that damage our side." What are your comments to that?

MR. McCLELLAN: What I've said previously, and I don't have anything else to add to what I've said previously.

Q Former President Clinton, a friend of the first President Bush and a friend of this President Bush, has said "they've gotten away with murder."

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, thank you. And you know our response on questions related to the investigation.

Q This is not a question. I'm asking you what are your thoughts as it relates to this quote from a former President of the United States.

MR. McCLELLAN: That's a question.

Go ahead, Connie.

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Q Scott, in the wake of the Valerie Plame incident, on which you will not comment, intelligence officials have indicated there's a growing concern among operatives in the field, a fear that they might be the targets of political manipulation. And they have indicated that something must be done on the part of the White House to help allay these fears. And given that these people are in the forefront of the war on terror, isn't it necessary to do something more than simply stonewalling all discussion of the incident in order to restore confidence?

MR. McCLELLAN: And I'll reject your characterization. What we're doing is helping to advance the investigation forward. And the President said he's not going to get into trying to draw conclusions based on reports in the media. Let's let the investigators complete their work. And that's what we've said, so I'll reject your characterization. We have for a long time said that we want to help them get to the bottom of this and the best way to do that is to cooperate fully in that investigation. And that means not commenting on it here from this podium.

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END 1:57 P.M. EDT