White House Compliance with Committee Subpoenas

Segment 3 Of 22     Previous Hearing Segment(2)   Next Hearing Segment(4)

SPEAKERS       CONTENTS       INSERTS

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    Mr. RUFF. I think it probable, given the life you lead, Congressman.

    Mr. KANJORSKI. I heard you say in reading a couple of their letters in response, ''Dear Mr. Chairman, we have to the best of my knowledge complied with your subpoena completely.'' And that word struck me, as a lawyer, that God only knows there is nothing in this world that is complete. And you are a lawyer and you agree with that, too. Invariably, whatever we do, somebody is going to go back to that White House and open up a file cabinet or talk to somebody somewhere, maybe the assistant stewardess on the President's helicopter, and find out that she had a taping machine one day and carried on a taping where somebody got on the helicopter with the President and he hadn't even thought about it. Isn't that correct?

    Mr. RUFF. It's a frightening prospect, but it's distinctly possible.

    Mr. KANJORSKI. All right. Now that we have an idea of the understanding. These are not hidden documents. These are things actually for historical record and future use of the archives of the library of this President as it has been for every President of modern times.

    Mr. RUFF. That's true, Congressman.

    Mr. KANJORSKI. And all this shaking and everything, they didn't produce the tapes, there is nothing—you are testifying there is absolutely no intent on—that you found from anyone in the White House, in your office, or any other place in the White House that they intended to do this, because, in fact, they didn't even recall or remember that these were made. And the people that should have didn't receive that one document in the inquiry to assemble all the documents that were missed; is that correct, the famous missing tapes?

 Page 148       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Mr. RUFF. That's correct. I think the record is absolutely clear on that. We are rightfully subject to criticism for failing to produce them because they were responsive. But there certainly is no basis for suggesting that it was anything other than the essentially mechanical problem that has been testified about on the public record.

    Mr. KANJORSKI. And so the American people understand that there—that is the best answer, made a mistake, damnedest mistake.

    I agree with Mr. Waxman. We don't like to hear you do those things. But then we have had the occasion to see how many mistakes this committee has made in the short life of this committee, and we don't nearly have the full burden to carry on the operation of the Presidency. So we are all prone to mistakes, and those of us that want to pretend that we are absolutely accurate and correct all the time are disingenuous. Our life isn't like that. The average American knows that. We don't have to belabor that.

    Now that we know this process has had a fracture in it or failing and we didn't get those tapes on time, it strikes me, as an average person in there, well, what are we arguing about here? Are we arguing about process or are we arguing about substance? The process obviously didn't work. And the majority of the committee has raised holy hell about that process not working.

    But let us assume that the process had worked and all the tapes that have been found or delivered had been found or delivered 2 or 3 months before because that is all the difference was. What have we found in those tapes that indicates anything wrong happened at the White House?

 Page 149       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Mr. RUFF. I think the answer to that is quite easy, Congressman, which is zero.

    Mr. KANJORSKI. Zero. No impropriety, no illegal activity, no conspiratorial activity. Actually, humorously, someone called my attention to it, they caught the President making a joke. After listening to the joke, he wished somebody had a tape of it; he would like to record that tape. Little did he know that joke is on tape, right?

    Mr. RUFF. That suggests the level to which cameras become part of the woodwork.

    Mr. KANJORSKI. That is right. Now if that is the case, there is nothing substantive in these tapes indicating any wrongdoing. We are spending an awful lot of time on process. And unless the majority of this committee can indicate there was an intentional act to subvert justice, or obstruct justice here—purposely cabal, if you will, a conspiracy at the White House to avoid answering a subpoena—then we are really wasting an awful lot of time about process. Process that didn't work for about 2 months or so until actually it did occur; is that correct?

    Mr. RUFF. That's correct, Congressman.

    Mr. KANJORSKI. It seems to me a lot to do about nothing. Not to say that when a committee of Congress asks the White House to do something isn't something, but what they asked them to do, if it had been done on time wouldn't have been worthy of one word in the newspaper, because there was no substance in the tapes. On the other hand, it shows us that the White House isn't any more perfect than this committee. It makes mistakes and sometimes doesn't find things or sometimes acts less than up to the standard we would like to see it act. But that wasn't done by political operatives in the White House or people of the President, that was done by military officers that are professional that had no reason to do that other than they either didn't get the material, the communication correctly, or they just didn't think about.

 Page 150       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Now, I think there is probably one other criticism of the White House. And I found that criticism myself in dealing with not only this White House, with this President, but past Presidents since I have been in office. I find it to be an area that is a little too focused and compartmentalized that one group doesn't talk to the next group. And as a result we don't get a synthesis of brain power working there but get very focused brain power.

    And sometimes, well, I guess the famous holes in the floor of the network and people starting to slip through where things are slipping through, and that is what is happening more often, as exemplified by the tapes, that, in fact, those 16 lawyers down there probably didn't go to enough parties at the White House to understand that they are taped. And maybe if we gave them a little more time and a little less subpoenas and requests for documents, they would be a little more socially minded. Maybe we should do that.

    Mr. RUFF. It sounds like a good idea.

    Mr. KANJORSKI. If I may, in closing, I appreciate it, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Ruff, I just wanted to point out that there is nothing sinister here. There is no conspiracy here. As a matter of fact, this is procedure over substance. And even when you get to the procedure it is a 2-month delay. But, clearly, when you get to the substance there was nothing in these tapes, never has been anything in these tapes, never will be, and therefore we are chasing fanciful goblins, if you will.

    Mr. RUFF. I agree, Congressman.

 Page 151       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Mr. KANJORSKI. Thank you very much.

    Mr. BURTON. Before I yield to Mr. Cox, I am going to take just a little bit of his time and I will then yield to him. I want to make three points. First of all we will be liberal with the clock, Mr. Waxman.

    Mr. WAXMAN. I hope it will be liberal on both sides. Let's keep track of the time on both sides.

    Mr. BURTON. Mr. Waxman, we will do that. I can assure you. I just gave Mr. Kanjorski a little extra time. We will try to be fair.

    The subpoena was sent regarding the tapes and all other materials 7 months before we received them. That is No. 1. No. 2, Ms. Mills knew about the White House data base memo 13 months before we received it. She knew about it. She knew it was in a file. Three, Ms. Mills and the President and most people close to the President knew there were tapes being made of the Presidential meetings for a long, long time.

    Now, you can say anything you want, Mr. Kanjorski, but these are the facts. Now, you say that there is nothing——

    Mr. KANJORSKI. Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. BURTON. No.

 Page 152       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Mr. KANJORSKI. If those are the facts—you mentioned my name in your remarks.

    Mr. BURTON. Mr. Kanjorski, those are the facts. You had your time. We will get back to your side.

    Mr. KANJORSKI. I would only call the Chair's attention——

    Mr. BURTON. We will get back to your side in a moment.

    Now I want to point out that there are some very interesting things on some of these tapes. I want to show you now a tape of December 7, 1995, during which the President openly discusses how to go around Federal election laws. Run that tape back and show it all. Wait until we shut off the machines because Mr. Waxman is leaving his on. Just 1 second. Wait till Mr. Waxman shuts off his machine. OK. Now you can show it. I want everybody to see this.

    [Video presentation was shown.]

    Mr. BURTON. I think that is one picture that is worth 1,000 words. The committee will stand in recess until after this vote.

    Mr. KANJORSKI. Mr. Chairman, if I can just say I'm shocked at that. Can you imagine funds down here in Washington being raised for campaigns? I am really shocked.

 Page 153       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    [Brief Recess.]

    Mr. RUFF. Mr. Chairman, forgive me, I wonder if before we begin I might just take a moment to respond to your comments as you closed the meeting, if I might have that privilege?

    Mr. BURTON. I am always anxious to hear your response, Mr. Ruff.

    Mr. RUFF. It will be brief, Mr. Chairman. I just want the record to be very clear, as I believe it has been on prior occasions when the segment of tape that you showed has been displayed elsewhere, that the President's comments about so-called issue ads reflected an entirely legitimate program of advertising that was engaged in by both the Republican National Committee and the Democratic National Committee, fully analyzed and approved by counsel. And I didn't want the record to remain silent, at least at my end of the record, with respect to your suggestion that there was something inappropriate with respect to that tape.

    Mr. BURTON. I think there is a divergence of opinion on that point. I think many people, some on both sides of the aisle, but certainly on the Republican side, believe that there was a definite, definite line that was crossed by the President when he was talking about using soft money for campaign ads that were going to benefit his re-election. And for that reason we think it was a very important piece to be shown to the audience.

    Ms. MILLS. Mr. Chairman, I would also just like to address one of the statements that you made.

 Page 154       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Mr. BURTON. Sure.

    Ms. MILLS. In particular with regard to my knowledge of tapes, I just wanted to assure you that I was unaware that WHCA taped the coffees. That's something I had no knowledge of. I simply was not familiar with what WHCA's practices were, with respect to what they did and did not tape. And I think, as probably was evident from the Senate hearings, WHCA's own supervisors were unaware of what they taped and what they did not tape. So certainly someone such as myself who was not a part of their office would be less likely also to have knowledge of that. I think there are many events that they do tape, but I simply was unaware, one, that they taped the coffees and, two, as to what their practices were as to what they did and wasn't taped.

    Mr. BURTON. Thank you, Ms. Mills. But the relevant point is you were in one tape and you knew tapes existed and you were Associate Counsel to the President of the United States and you didn't even tell Mr. Ruff about them and we think that is very curious.

    Mr. Cox.

    Mr. COX. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    And I welcome the two witnesses that have joined us this morning that were not part of yesterday's proceedings so that we now have four members of the White House Counsel's Office before us. As you perhaps know, I served 10 years ago in the White House Counsel's Office in a position similar to yours. And I empathize with the demands that are placed upon you. I mentioned at the outset yesterday that in the Iran-Contra investigation, the White House produced some 250,000 pages of documents fully apart from and on top of all the documents produced by other parts of the executive branch of Government. And that is more than twice as many as have been produced in this manner. We did it in less than half the time. And I am well aware of the burden that it places on the office.

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    In that investigation, and I read yesterday from the report of the Senate select committee, because the chairman and the vice chairman of that committee who were both, of course, Democrats and not of the same political party as the President of the United States, praise the White House and the White House Counsel's Office for its responsiveness in every respect to document requests.

    And I would hope that the integrity of the White House Counsel's Office, which has been high in administration after administration, would be something that you all would be interested in upholding. And I am concerned that mechanically, the procedures that are being followed are not designed to either evidence full cooperation or to result in it. Rather, we are here today because we have several examples such as the memorandum that says that the President of the United States wants us to integrate the White House data base with the DNC data base, a document that was uncovered by the White House Counsel's Office. That is what it says. It was not turned over in response to our request for information about the White House data base. Nothing could be more clearly a smoking memo than this. And to hang on to it for so long having looked at it, having intelligent lawyers involved in this evidences all the wrong things about the Counsel's Office.

    Mr. Ruff, I met with you earlier this year and explained how I thought it was beyond the pale that a subpoena could be issued in March of this year and that months after the return date on the subpoena, the subpoena being a lawful demand for the production of documents and a valid one, that we had not gotten the documents that we should have gotten in response to that subpoena. The subpoena was issued on March 4th. The return date was March 24th on the subpoena. Your office did not issue a directive to other parts of the White House, such as WHCA, the Military Office, and so on, until April 28th, long after the return date on the subpoena. So you didn't even start to look for the documents until after legally they were due.

 Page 156       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Now, we are here after you have provided the committee with a letter in June saying the White House has produced all documents responsive to the committee subpoenas with the exception of those documents that appear on the privilege logs that we have provided the committee, except of course for the videotapes.

    And the videotapes were asked for by the U.S. Senate in a letter in plain English that says, does WHCA have any videotapes? And yet, it wasn't until a long time afterward that these videotapes were produced.

    Now yesterday I asked you whether this New York Times headline, which is three columns across and three lines deep, that says ''Reno in Letter to Congress Rejects Most Allegations That Clinton Violated Law.'' This was on October 4th. You said that you were aware of that headline. And of course it ran in every newspaper in America. Because the day before, October 3rd, was a very important day, the date on which everybody expected the Attorney General was going to decide whether to go forward with an Independent Counsel. And you met with the Attorney General of the United States the day before. You met with her at 3 p.m. And I asked you whether or not you had done anything unusual that morning. And you said no. But I asked further, then, whether or not you had watched videotapes of White House coffees that morning. And you said yes. And you acknowledge that actually was an unusual thing because you had just learned about those White House coffee tapes that morning. And I asked you whether or not you were aware at the time that you met with the Attorney General later that day, that the Justice Department had outstanding, a document request that covered those videotapes and you said yes.

    Now, you have already told us in your deposition that you didn't tell the Attorney General about the existence of those videotapes. And I asked you yesterday whether you told anyone else. I asked you whether you told the President. I asked you whether you told the Chief of Staff, whether you told Mike McCurry, or whether you called anybody outside the White House. And you said in response to all of those things, no, you did not.

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    I would like to ask you now whether or not you told anyone else besides your own staff about the existence of these videotapes prior to your meeting at 3 p.m., on October 3rd with the—excuse me, on October 2nd with the Attorney General. That was a Thursday, the day before she made her decision on October 3rd. Prior to your—pardon me, I want to make sure I have this chronology straight. You discovered the existence of the tapes on the very day you met with the Attorney General; is that right?

    Mr. RUFF. I was told about the tapes; that's correct.

    Mr. COX. And watched them.

    Mr. RUFF. Watched three of them, I believe.

    Mr. COX. And later that day you met with the Attorney General?

    Mr. RUFF. That's correct.

    Mr. COX. And did not tell her about the existence of those tapes that day?

    Mr. RUFF. That's correct.

    Mr. COX. And did you tell anybody else outside the White House Counsel's Office before your meeting with her at 3 o'clock?

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    Mr. RUFF. No, I did not.

    Mr. COX. The next day when the Attorney General, one of those headlines for absolving the President in saying we didn't need an Independent Counsel, did you tell anybody outside the White House Counsel's Office that day?

    Mr. RUFF. Let me, if I may, describe the sequence of events so that you have a full understanding of the persons outside the Counsel's Office who were aware of this and the time in which they became aware of it.

    Mr. COX. If I may, I just want to know who you told.

    Mr. RUFF. That's what I'm about to explain to you. On Thursday afternoon, as has already been testified by Mr. Imbroscio, he informed counsel for the Senate about the existence of the tapes. I believe on Friday morning, I advised——

    Mr. COX. I'm sorry, you told the Senate about this when?

    Mr. RUFF. One of my staff members told the Senate about this on Thursday afternoon.

    Mr. COX. Before you told the Justice Department?

    Mr. RUFF. I don't know what the timing was.

 Page 159       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Mr. COX. But the Justice Department knew before——

    Mr. RUFF. Yes. Before the Justice Department was aware of that.

    Mr. COX. The Attorney General didn't find out until after the——

    Mr. RUFF. You're absolutely correct. You're absolutely correct. I'm walking through the sequence with you.

    So that the Senate counsel was aware of this on Thursday afternoon. On Friday morning, I advised Ms. Mills, as she's previously testified. I've also spoken with Deputy Chief of Staff Podesta and advised him of the existence of the tapes, the fact that we were searching for them. I don't think there was anybody else outside the Counsel's Office who I informed on that day.

    Mr. COX. And at what point did you discuss this with the President for the first time?

    Mr. RUFF. I did not—I was not the first person who discussed this matter with the President as I think has also been a matter of public record. My only conversation with the President on this subject occurred after the press leakage over the weekend to advise him that the tapes would be released both to the Congress and to the press.

 Page 160       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Mr. COX. I asked these questions about your involvement because I want to know who is in charge of this investigation. You represented to us that the White House has produced all documents responsive to the committee subpoenas, even though it was months after they were due, in June 1997. And even though it turned out that you had not produced all documents in response to these subpoenas, because they were discovered later. I want to know who is in charge. You qualified your representation to the committee by saying to the best of your knowledge. So it matters a great deal to us in understanding the value of your representation to us how much you know and how actively you are involved.

    As you know, a major part of the investigation is into illegal payments, both by Congress and by the Justice Department. Those investigations concerns alleged money laundering between the Teamsters and the DNC and the Teamsters and the Clinton/Gore campaign. Because you represented the Teamsters in 1994, I take it you have recused yourself of all matters having to do with this?

    Mr. RUFF. That's correct.

    Mr. COX. Has your recusal been in writing?

    Mr. RUFF. I don't believe it's been in writing. I advised my staff and I had nothing to do with that aspect of the investigation.

    Mr. COX. And who in the White House is in charge of that part of the investigation?

 Page 161       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Mr. RUFF. Mr. Breuer, as part of his supervision of the investigative side of the office, is responsible for producing all documents and responding to questions with respect to any aspect of campaign finance, including any inquiries that may come in about the Teamsters.

    Mr. COX. Now, in your representations to the Congress about responses to subpoenas, do you have procedures that you follow to make sure that somebody else is making representations concerning the Teamsters?

    Mr. RUFF. The basis of any representation I make to the Congress is intended to reflect the collective wisdom and understanding and activity of my office. Obviously, I write on behalf of the office as well as signing the letter personally. And I rely, and I think rely well, on my staff to be sure that what representations I make on the office's behalf are accurate ones.

    Mr. COX. Mr. Chairman, and the members on the minority side, if I might, yesterday I asked a question to Mr. Ruff, which he answered under oath. He has told me in a sidebar he would like to change his answer to that question. I would like to give him an opportunity to do that. May I have additional time for that purpose?

    Mr. BURTON. Yes. We will give the Democrat side additional time as well. Go ahead.

    Mr. COX. One of the matters that we discussed yesterday was your response to the Senate's letter asking whether there were videotapes by WHCA of these events, such as we have seen here, that would be responsive to their subpoena and indicating that they thought there were such documents and asking for a definitive reply. I asked whether or not you had written a memo in response to that inquiry from the Senate, which was made in August of this year. You replied that you had not sent your own memo asking for those documents. And I take it that is still your testimony today. But I also asked you whether a copy of that letter was provided to the Military Office. And you testified yesterday that the Counsel's Office did not provide a copy of it. And my understanding is that, in fact, another member of the Counsel's Office, not you, but another member did provide that letter; is that correct?

 Page 162       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Mr. RUFF. That's correct, Congressman. When I responded to your questions yesterday, I was unaware of the fact that Mr. Imbroscio of my staff had, in fact, when he met with Mr. Smith of WHCA, I believe on August 29th, turned over a copy to Mr. Smith of the August 19th letter. I advised you this morning before the session began of that fact and that I wanted to clarify the record. I appreciate your giving me the opportunity to do that.

    Mr. COX. Mr. Ruff, the reason I remain concerned is that when we call you up here to testify under oath about an investigation over which you have control about a matter that we have discussed at some great length that has been the subject of national headlines, and when I ask you whether the letter asking for the tapes had gone from the White House Counsel's Office to WHCA, you didn't know the answer to that question yesterday. You only have discovered the answer between yesterday and today. That means that some underling was handling this and you were not handling it. And it again raises a question of whether somebody is really in charge of this investigation and whether it is being taken seriously inside the White House. Every indication that I have is that it is not.

    I thank you for the clarification.

    Mr. RUFF. Just a moment, Congressman, Mr. Chairman, my apologies. That simply cannot go unresponded to, Congressman Cox. I do my best when I appear before this committee or any committee or any other public forum to be aware of the relevant facts and to be prepared to respond. You are quite correct that I did not know yesterday that one of my staff members had given this letter. And I thought it would be helpful to this committee to understand what the true facts were, indeed, I would commend to the committee a full review of the relevant depositions so that those facts are fully set out on both the private and the public record. Beyond that, though, I think, Congressman Cox, you have to go back to my answer yesterday to your basic question suggesting that there was somehow a failing in the process once the August 19th letter had been received. And what I told you in response to that, and which I think is directly responsive to the underlying concern you have, is that at the moment that that letter was received and in the ensuing days and weeks, one of my staff members was directly involved in seeking to respond to the Senate's inquiry. And thus that, the issue of whether a new directive went out was, in my view, not an issue of note during that period.

 Page 163       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Mr. COX. Mr. Ruff.

    Mr. RUFF. Just a moment, Congressman. I'm entitled, I believe, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. COX. You have had more time than I have.

    Mr. RUFF. I don't think so, Mr. Congressman. I want to be, with all due respect, sure that the record is absolutely clear. If you have concerns about the extent to which I am responsible for or taking responsibility for the operations of this investigation, I'll be happy to address them. But I think when I come to you in a good faith effort to clarify the record, that does not justify a suggestion that somehow my failure to know that fact yesterday afternoon suggests anything other than full responsibility in every respect for the ongoing nature of the investigation.

    Mr. COX. Counsel.

    Mr. BURTON. The gentleman's time has expired. I would like to say to Mr. Cox that we will have another round. And I hope you will come back and address this.

    Mr. COX. I shall, indeed.

    Mr. BURTON. OK. Thank you. How much time, additional time was there on Mr. Cox's time? Four minutes. The minority will be given 14 minutes. Mr. Waxman.

 Page 164       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Chairman, just to put this matter into context, I take this investigation very seriously. And I know Mr. Burton does as well. But there are things that go on that he and I both aren't fully apprised of. And I see this often, because in exchange of letters after I have talked to Mr. Burton, he hasn't been aware of all the things in these letters. I think the fact that you weren't aware of one issue should not lead people to the conclusion that Mr. Cox is reaching, because that is preposterous. You are saying that you weren't aware of one transmittal of a letter to another department; is that the issue, Mr. Ruff?

    Mr. RUFF. That's correct.

    Mr. WAXMAN. And therefore, from that fact, which you voluntarily brought to our attention to make sure that the record was straight, he is trying to reach the conclusion that you are not serious about the investigation, you are not serious about your job, you are not following the ethical standards that would be required of you?

    Mr. RUFF. I, as my comments to Congressman Cox reflect, and I trust not in disrespectful tone, reject any such suggestion.

    Mr. WAXMAN. OK. Mr. Lantos.

    Mr. LANTOS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

    I want to associate myself with the ranking member's observations. I think it is outrageous, it is outrageous to imply that since Mr. Ruff does not know of every single communication of any—of all of the members of his staff, to all of the entities involved here, there is something inappropriate here. And I want to state for the record I have total confidence in your integrity and professionalism, Mr. Ruff.

 Page 165       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Mr. RUFF. Thank you, Congressman.

    Mr. LANTOS. I did not expect to be treated to XXX-Rated movies earlier today. But since the chairman chose to show the Clinton movie, which I thought I was too young really to see because it relates to his comment about how the funds raised by Democrats will be used for democratic campaign purposes, I would like to show and read several similar XXX-Rated observations of Presidential candidate Bob Dole and President Ronald Reagan. So if we can have the tape, if it is ready. If not, I will be happy to read it.

    [Video tape presentation shown.]

    Mr. LANTOS. Well, this little XXX-Rated piece sort of equalizes the field, Mr. Chairman. Presidential candidate Clinton and Presidential candidate Dole tell their, I have people and the media that, through the use of soft money, they hope to advance their respective candidacies. I was shocked when I saw the Clinton tape, but now my mind is at peace again, because I see that the playing field is level and equalized.

    But I also would like to offer some historic views on this. And without any hint of criticism of President Reagan, I would like to read to you statements of former President Ronald Reagan concerning identical events.

    The Republican Eagles event held in the East Room on 9/30/87, President Reagan: ''You started as just 85 contributors, but your support helped our party. . . . You played a vital role in our victory in 1980. Thanks to the Eagles, the Republican Party had the financial strength, not only to recapture the White House, but to recapture the Senate as well. . . . I know this is silly, but can I count on you to help out in 1988? . . . Besides keeping the White House the top of our list is getting back the Senate, and I know we have got a lot of people here today to help lead that charge.'' End President Reagan.

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    Republican Eagles event, 9/12/85, East Room: ''You have made all the difference. The hard work and generosity of the Eagles has provided us with the means to send out those messages. . . . Please don't just keep up your tremendous work, redouble your efforts.'' End Senator—President Reagan.

    Dinner reception in the East Room, April 29, 1987: ''I want each of you to know how grateful we are for your generous support for our cause. . . . Your efforts have made the dinner tonight an unparalleled success. . . . I am expecting tonight that they will tell us that last year we set the record for a political fund-raising event. And tonight, we are going to break that all-time record. . . . I am told that this function has raised an enormous sum. It is tough enough raising political funds in an election year, but to do it in an off year, . . . thank you.''

    President's dinner reception, 5/11/88, the East Room: President Reagan: ''Nancy and I want to say a special word of thanks to those of you that made a special contribution toward this evening. . . . The proceeds from the splendid evening will go to a cause that can hardly be more important to the future of our Nation, giving George Bush a Congress he can work with.''

    Republican re-election committee, East Room, 8/29/84, President Reagan: ''You raised funds that we spent down at the grass-roots in all 50 States, and these funds went to aspects of the campaign that were important. The results speak for themselves.''

    President's dinner reception, East Room, May 10, 1984: ''I want to give my heartfelt thanks to all of you in this room. . . . We still have a lot to do and that is why your support during this campaign is vital.''

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    President's trust donors meeting, East Room, April 2, 1985: ''You raised almost $7 million to support the re-election effort.''

    Republican congressional leadership counsel reception, April 22, 1985, East Room, President Reagan: ''I appreciate all you have done for the Republican Party. . . . The Republican Congressional Leadership Council was able to funnel,'' and funnel is a very tricky word here, ''funnel $4 million into Republican congressional campaigns. . . . I know that many of you were instrumental in giving us the means to keep control of the Senate. I hope I can count on all of you next time around.''

    Now these quotes go on ad nauseam and ad infinitum.

    The point I want to make, Mr. Chairman, is that when you showed a tiny clip of President Clinton making a statement, which is indistinguishable from the statements of former Senator Dole and President Reagan, you said a picture is worth 1,000 words. Well, pictures occasionally are, but not these pictures.

    These pictures show fund-raising events. Some of us feel that fund-raising needs to be reformed. Some of you on the Republican side don't. But to make this a partisan issue reeks of hypocrisy. I want you to reread every one of President Reagan's statements. I want you to look at the Dole clip again, and then say, mia culpa, mia maxima culpa, I was guilty of one-sided, blatant partisanship, and I will not engage in this any further.

    There is one more point I would like to make. Yesterday I suggested that we are engaged in a trivial pursuit and I apologize to the concept of trivial pursuit because what we are engaged in is much less than a trivial pursuit. It is a diversion. It is a diversion at a time the country has serious problems. But it is not just a diversion. This issue is not only a pointless exercise, but it is a harmful exercise.

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    It is a harmful exercise, Mr. Chairman, in two ways. It is a harmful exercise internationally because the work of this committee is making a laughing stock of the Congress of the United States, across the globe, as Saddam Hussein is getting ready to build weapons of mass destruction; as global issues crowd in on us on all continents; and we are trying to find out whether it was Thursday or Friday that Mr. Ruff or somebody in his staff notified someone on the Senate committee or in the Attorney General's office as to the availability of these breathtaking tapes, these tapes which have shaped American history, which showed Clinton was raising money in the White House, as was Bush, as was Reagan, as were other Presidents. So it is harmful to us abroad, because instead of this legislative body being seen to be engaged in the serious work dealing with the problems of the United States of America, we are engaged in what I can most generously label only as a trivial pursuit.

    It is harmful to us domestically. There is already a great deal of lack of trust between the American people and their Government. And by attempting to undermine faith and trust in our governmental institutions, these hearings undermine confidence in our democratic system of government.

    So it is not only pointless, it is not only trivial, it is harmful, and I hope, Mr. Chairman, as I asked you yesterday, that you will follow the example of your distinguished fellow Republican, Senator Thompson, and recognize that this circus must come to an end. We have played it long enough, we have played it hard enough, we have come up with nothing, and the time has come to admit it and to say so. Thank you.

    Mr. WAXMAN. Thank you, Mr. Lantos. We have a couple minutes left on this round. Mr. Cummings is the next Member in order of seniority who has not asked questions yet. I want to ask if he wants to ask questions at this time or reserve his time for the next round.

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    Mr. CUMMINGS. I would prefer to reserve my time, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Kucinich, I will recognize you. You will have the balance of the time.

    Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and members of the committee.

    One of the things which has concerned me as a member of this committee, from the comments that I heard yesterday relative to news shows where certain suspicions were broadcast publicly, is that some Members are proceeding with offering what is an implied verdict, that wrongdoing was committed, that crimes were committed, and I would just like to say publicly that I think we do the House better credit if we proceed from first the facts, and then the verdicts, instead of an Alice in Wonderland scenario of first the verdict and then the facts.

    The Senate just spent $2.2 million to hold 32 hearings featuring 81 witnesses and allegations of campaign finance abuses, including 3 days of hearings on videotapes in the White House. These issues are also being investigated by the Department of Justice task force, Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr, and a number of other congressional committees. This committee has already spent at least $3 million on this investigation.

    I would like to ask, Mr. Ruff, is there anything you can tell us today or have told us today, other than the incident involving a lack of communication with one piece of paper, that you haven't already told the U.S. Senate?

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    Mr. RUFF. I would like to think that the record is fairly clear on many fronts, both at the Senate and in the media on this subject, Congressman, and it may be that there is somewhere in the recesses of my brain a piece of information which is not on the record, but I can't think of what it is.

    Mr. KUCINICH. Is it true that every person, relevant to this issue, from the White House counsel to the chief petty officer in charge of the audio visual unit, gave extensive testimony to the U.S. Senate?

    Mr. RUFF. I believe that is the case.

    Mr. KUCINICH. Isn't it also true that most, if not all, of the major areas of questions which have been put to you in these hearings, were put to the White House personnel who testified before the Senate?

    Mr. RUFF. That is correct.

    Mr. KUCINICH. Now there have been accusations of altering the videotapes. Isn't it true that in the Senate hearings, Chief Petty Officer McGrath, Mr. Imbroscio, Colonel Campbell, and Mr. Smith all categorically rejected Chairman Burton's allegation of tape alterations?

    Mr. RUFF. Very clearly.

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    Mr. KUCINICH. Some members of this committee have suggested that the Counsel's Office omitted videotapes from the definition of responsive documents in its directive to all White House personnel. Isn't it a fact that the Counsel's Office directive instructed White House officers to provide all records, that is whether in hard copy, computer or other form?

    Mr. RUFF. That is correct, Congressman.

    Mr. KUCINICH. And isn't it also a fact that this issue was discussed at length in the Senate hearings, and in those hearings laid to rest?

    Mr. RUFF. That is correct.

    Mr. KUCINICH. And you gave extensive testimony in the Senate that there was no effort whatsoever to exclude videos of political coffees from the White House document search?

    Mr. RUFF. I did.

    Mr. KUCINICH. And the lawyers and career military people who testified in the Senate said that every effort was made to comply with the demands of this committee, the Senate committee, and the Department of Justice?

    Mr. RUFF. And we believe we have always engaged in a good faith effort to be responsive.

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    Mr. KUCINICH. Now, how much of the materials produced by the White House in response to the committee subpoenas duplicated what was provided to the Senate?

    Mr. RUFF. I think the vast bulk.

    Mr. KUCINICH. OK.

    Mr. BURTON. Mr. Kucinich, one thing I would like to say, Mr. Kucinich, is you were gone some of yesterday and there are some other relevant documents we did not receive in a timely fashion which we would be happy to provide for you.

    Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. BURTON. Mr. Barr, you are recognized for 10 minutes.

    Mr. BARR. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. Ruff, if we could turn our attention back, please, to your discussion yesterday with Mr. McIntosh, and if we could have the document 147 up on the screen, please. Document 147, as I am sure you will recall, Mr. Ruff, is the one that says at the top of that page, Harold and Deborah DeLee want to make sure WHoDB is integrated with DNC data base so we can share, evidently POTUS wants this too, make sense, then it goes on from there.

    If I am not mistaken, in response to some questions from Mr. McIntosh, you used a word to describe the essence of this document that doesn't appear in it. I know you are a very learned man, and I know also you are a very, very careful attorney and you choose your words very, very carefully, as you should. And, therefore, when you used this certain word yesterday, I wondered why you were using it because it doesn't appear in the document and it has a meaning quite different from the plain meaning of the words in the documents. The word in the document that I believe Mr. McIntosh was talking about was the word ''integrated,'' and he was talking about that in the context of having two data bases, the White House data base and DNC, and integrating them together. And in response to his question, I think you very deliberately used a word, not ''integrate'' but ''compatible,'' to make them compatible, and making two data bases compatible is something very, very different from integrating them, as I am sure you know.

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    Compatible means, and I quote from the dictionary here, ''capable of existing or operating together in harmony,'' the implication being you have two entities that are different and very distinct, but they work together, and I certainly agree with you, that it is not against the law to make two data bases compatible. That is very different from making those two data bases—to integrate those two data bases. To integrate means to form, to coordinate or blend into a functioning or unified whole.

    I was just wondering why you chose to use the term ''compatible,'' which is not used in this document, as I suspect—and maybe this is your job as a lawyer, to, you know, shift the focus, change the meaning of something.

    Do you not see that this document is talking about integrating two data bases and would you not agree that that is different, substantially different, from simply taking steps to make two data bases compatible with each other?

    [Exhibit 147 follows:]

    INSERT OFFSET FOLIOS 79 HERE

    Mr. RUFF. First, I appreciate your suggestion that I am either learned or careful. I do try to be careful. I reject the notion, however, of being learned certainly when it comes to the White House data base. As I think I indicated in my response to Congressman McIntosh, I neither have nor aspire to a level of understanding of the intricacies of the White House data base. But that said, my effort to try to be responsive yesterday to his questions was to suggest that—and I have no idea, obviously, what the author of this memo may or may not have meant.

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    Mr. BARR. Have you checked into it?

    Mr. RUFF. No, I certainly have not.

    Mr. BARR. Do you intend to?

    Mr. RUFF. Congressman Barr, I know you will appreciate fully the constraints that the White House Counsel's Office operates under. We tend not to conduct independent inquiries because those inquiries, in turn, tend to become the subject of further inquiries.

    Mr. BARR. Do you intend to forward this to the Attorney General, since on its face this would seem to indicate, very clearly, that two data bases, which by law cannot be merged or integrated, unified, that it is the intent of at least some people to do just that? Does that not concern you as an attorney?

    Mr. RUFF. These documents are, in fact, in the possession of the Justice Department for whatever action they deem appropriate. What I was trying to suggest in my response to Congressman McIntosh yesterday, albeit from less than a learned posture, was that it is fully appropriate to make incoming information available, that is, that two data bases could be compatible for purposes of sharing information from the DNC into the White House. If I did not make myself clear on that, I should have done a better job. But I do not purport either to understand exactly what Mr. Bailey meant when he took these notes, nor did I intend, certainly, to suggest that I was reaching any conclusion, either as to the meaning of ''integration'' or to use ''compatible,'' other than in my understanding of the capacity to absorb information from the DNC. There is no suggestion on my part, and I believe there is none in this memorandum, of any impropriety or illegality.

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    Mr. BARR. Well, OK, that really gets us back to some of the fundamental concerns here, and maybe our focus ought to be on the process. I know we heard from folks on the other side earlier, they don't think that the process is important, they make light of it. I would hope that you won't, and don't.

    Process goes to the heart of whether or not our system of laws in this country and our system of government operates properly. Process is at the heart of our Federal statutes on obstruction. Folks on the other side, you were very ready to agree with them that this is all about process in response to their questions that that is not important. I beg to differ. I think process is very important, and time and time again, we see people look at documents, look at tapes, even when they are in them and say, oh, that is not important, we don't know what that means, that, no, that raises no questions.

    One can look at the tapes that have just been played and reach a certain conclusion about those tapes, whether they are tapes from 10 years ago or from a year ago, but to simply and constantly turn a blind eye to say, oh, a document that talks about integrating two data bases that by law cannot and should not be integrated, and saying, oh, we are too busy to do anything about that, and I don't see anything wrong with that anyway, yet it is very easy for you to say, oh, it looks as if they are just talking about something being compatible, raises very serious questions in our mind.

    Another thing that raises very serious questions in our mind is you all's use of executive privilege, and I would like now to turn to that, although perhaps it might be better, Mr. Chairman, after the next vote, in the context of another very disturbing incident.

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    Mr. BURTON. Does the gentleman wish to suspend at this point and come back?

    Mr. BARR. The gentleman does.

    Mr. BURTON. The Chair will stand in recess. He will conclude his interrogation when we come back.

    [Brief Recess.]

    Mr. BURTON. The committee will reconvene.

    When we recessed, Mr. Barr of Georgia was in the middle of his questioning. I think he has some time remaining, so don't start the clock just yet; wait until Mr. Barr is ready.

    I might inform anybody who is interested, the next time we have a series of votes, because it is lunch time, or past lunch time, and Mr. Ruff said he cannot stand not having a sandwich, especially if it is egg salad—that is a personal joke. What we will do is, we will break for at least 30 minutes so everybody can get a sandwich or something to eat. Are you ready, Mr. Barr?

    Mr. BARR. Yes, Mr. Chairman. Before going into one other area, I would like to have document 162 put up. Mr. Ruff, this document also concerns the White House data base, and——

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    [The information referred to follows:]

    INSERT OFFSET FOLIOS 80 TO 81 HERE

    Mr. RUFF. Excuse me, Mr. Barr, can I try to find it in my book here. I see it. Thank you very much.

    Mr. BARR. This document, similar to the one we were discussing earlier, although typed instead of handwritten, also relates to the White House data base. This document was provided to the committee or subcommittee, I believe in February 1997.

    For those of us, I guess you and I both fall into this category, that we don't know an awful lot about data bases, but at least I understand the difference between integrating and making data bases compatible, and I thought we both agreed that it would be illegal for campaign data bases to be integrated with the official data base of the White House. I am not sure we even agree on that. But if you look, Mr. Ruff, at this document, particularly the last paragraph on the first page, which goes into, in some length, about proposing a new system, and, well, I see they use your word ''compatible'' there. In the second paragraph, however, on the first paragraph on the second page, they go into great length about a system, they talk about PeopleBase, which is a campaign data base, a political data base, and then go on to talk about the DNC designing a system that will meet needs and specifications to clone another system for specific uses later on, that the information stored with PeopleBase could then be dumped into the new system, presumably the White House data base, and made available when deemed necessary to the DNC.

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    I don't know a lot about computers either, Mr. Ruff, but I do note, when I see somebody discussing taking information from one data base into another, making these two data bases work together, and explicitly talking about taking information, store it in a political campaign data base, putting it into the new White House system, making it available to the DNC, is against the law. And we have the First Lady saying, this sounds promising, please advise.

    Now I am not sure we know what the advice to her was, but as with the first document that we looked at earlier, on its face, there seems to be at least a colorable issue raised of illegality. I happen to think it is more than a colorable inference of illegality, but I think at a minimum is that.

    This document was provided to us earlier this year. The one we talked about previously was not. We did not get this one until last week, even though, as with this document, they both talk very clearly about the data bases. I think it is obstruction not to have provided this. I think there is no reasonable explanation that has been put forward, and I guess, again, I would like to ask you why is it that when you looked at these documents, and I understand that you all have a lot to do, but when you look at these documents on their face, they don't raise in your mind any inference whatsoever, possibility that there was illegal action occurring here, merging these two data bases in some way?

    Mr. RUFF. Congressman Barr, I will give you the one-line answer and then if I can impose on the committee, I will ask my colleague, Ms. Mills, who knows a lot more about the issue of the data bases than I do, to respond to the specific questions you have.

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    The basic answer is no, we do not believe that anything that either was contemplated or that happened with respect to WhoDB involved any impropriety, much less any violation of law, and if I can, I will let Ms. Mills try to address the particular language of this memorandum as it bears on the relationship between the data bases.

    Ms. MILLS. Mr. Barr, I think the paragraphs you are referencing are all referencing outside data bases and the sharing of information with respect to those outside data bases.

    The last paragraph which you reference indicates my conversations with the DNC about the new system they are proposing. ''We have asked that their system be modeled after whatever system we decide to use outside the White House.'' That is with respect to whatever other data bases are going to be used to deal with the campaign or the DNC's data base, outside the White House. PeopleBase, which you referred to as a political data base is not; it is actually the Legacy data base of President Clinton from his time as Governor in Arkansas.

    Mr. BARR. That wasn't the Clinton/Gore data base?

    Ms. MILLS. No, it was not. PeopleBase is the Governor's data base of contacts with people and correspondence that he had as Governor.

    Mr. BARR. It was used for political purposes?

    Ms. MILLS. Actually, the PeopleBase was used as a means of maintaining his contacts with individuals that he met and dealt with as Governor of Arkansas.

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    Mr. BARR. But it was used for political purposes.

    Ms. MILLS. I am not aware it was used for political purposes.

    Mr. BARR. I am not asking if you were—I mean, what you have just described is——

    Ms. MILLS. Well, you are asserting that it is.

    Mr. BARR [continuing]. A political process.

    Ms. MILLS. I guess if you can believe serving as Governor of Arkansas, that is a political process, then, yes, I agree with you.

    Mr. BARR. We are making progress.

    Ms. MILLS. OK. I am happy to say that all politicians are obviously involved in politics, and to the extent they have data bases that are associated with the work that they perform in their duties, then to the extent that that is perceived as political, they are obviously politicians, that is political, but it relates to what they do when they are elected to do those jobs.

    Mr. BARR. And how do you, then, explain away the top paragraph on page 2?

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    Ms. MILLS. Well, I won't attempt to explain it away, but I will attempt to tell you what my understanding of the truth is with respect to this document as I understand it.

    With respect to the second part, it is talking about cloning or duplicating different data bases can be done relatively easy, they have been able to establish it can be done on the outside, therefore, their suggestion they take the old outdated PeopleBase that doesn't meet their needs and let their team work with the DNC to design a system that meets their needs, that is with respect to the DNC's data base, an outside data base. In other words, we are not going to use the format that was used in PeopleBase for the DNC's data base; we are going to use a new format that is more user friendly, also outside of the White House.

    Mr. BARR. Does it disturb you, or perhaps Mr. Ruff, that White House people are doing this? I mean, clearly, there are at least two, maybe there are three, but at least two different data bases here, a political data base and the development of a White House data base. And then you also have the DNC ones.

    You are talking about people at the White House, paid by the taxpayers of this country, to perform official duties, engaging in setting up data base or data bases, and then working with the DNC dumping information back and forth, again, that doesn't raise any red lights or you think this is perfectly hunky-dory and ethical and legal, obviously.

    Ms. MILLS. I think I am on the record as to what is ethical and appropriate with respect to the data base. We are allowed to take information in with respect to the data base. I think the other thing that is important to remember is that the Hatch Act clearly intends and expects that there will be people who engage in political activity and they draw careful lines——

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    Mr. BARR. The Hatch Act is not a defense to what we are talking about.

    Ms. MILLS. The Hatch Act clearly anticipates and has for many years understood that people will engage in political activity——

    Mr. BARR. The Hatch Act——

    Ms. MILLS. What it does do is try and draw——

    Mr. BARR. If you don't see that, you don't see anything.

    Ms. MILLS. Well, I would like to respond. I don't know how you can know what I see if I haven't at least tried to give you an opportunity to understand.

    Mr. BURTON. Ms. Mills, I think the point has been made. The gentleman's time has expired. We will have another round, Mr. Barr, and we will give you an opportunity to revisit this issue.

    Mr. Waxman is not back but we will yield 10 or 12 minutes to Mr. Fattah and whomever else he designates, as the senior member here on the Democrat side.

    Mr. FATTAH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and let me try to cover a few important points here. One is that I have had the responsibility to serve on this committee in two successive Congresses, so I am somewhat aware of this data base issue because it was one of the various investigations we as a committee conducted in regard to the White House in the last session. It is not, however, part of the investigation of foreign influences and illegalities connected to the 1996 election, so some people who may be spectators here might be somewhat confused because the committee has spent at least half of its time focusing in on a subject unrelated to the subject matter of the committee's new charge, but the data base may be a priority of the committee. But I want to put on the record that if it is, the committee has held not one—the subcommittee has held not one hearing this year and only held one hearing in all of last year, so this interesting focus on the data base itself is a new found interest at best. It is intruding upon what was at least allegedly going to be this massive investigation of foreign influences and illegal contributions in the 1996 campaign, but I want to try to clear a few things up.

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    Let me ask Mr. Ruff, a data base, just so that those of us who are following this can understand it, is a list of names and addresses and contacts, information?

    Mr. RUFF. That is correct.

    Mr. FATTAH. Phone numbers.

    Mr. RUFF. Stored in a computer, as I understand it.

    Mr. FATTAH. Would there be a legal distinction between whether or not you kept those on a three by five card or whether you kept them in a computer?

    Mr. RUFF. Not that I can think of.

    Mr. FATTAH. A data base is a Rolodex; it is an address book?

    Mr. RUFF. That is in essence correct.

    Mr. FATTAH. So if a Member of Congress or the Vice President or the President of the United States or anyone in conduct with their professional duties might have a phone log or a Rolodex these are the essential ingredients; the only difference here is that they were put into a computer?

    Mr. RUFF. That is correct.

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    Mr. FATTAH. Now the committee's interest in this data base precedes you becoming White House Counsel?

    Mr. RUFF. It does, yes.

    Mr. FATTAH. So the memos you were being questioned about, you were not around in 1994 when this was written, right?

    Mr. RUFF. That is true.

    Mr. FATTAH. But there wouldn't be—I mean, if by chance any of us had on our Rolodexes back in our office a list of politically important people in our districts, or people who supported us, there wouldn't be any difference between that Rolodex, from a legal distinction, and a computer data base, right?

    Mr. RUFF. That is true.

    Mr. FATTAH. Even some of the Members of Congress, who are computer literate, they have these hand-held systems where they can call people on and so on. So the interest here about whether or not the President had enough common sense to want to stay in touch with his supporters is not a big distinction between those of us who do that here?

    Mr. RUFF. I trust everybody who runs for office probably wants to do the same thing.

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    Mr. FATTAH. Well, I think that the other issue I want to cover has to do more with the 1996 investigation. There has been some discussion about a check that was delivered to the White House and it was then sent over to the DNC, and in the Congress, we have a set of rules, that if we inadvertently receive a contribution, we have I think up to 7 days to get it from our office to our political campaigns. The White House, as I understand it, has a policy that says, basically, immediately or as soon as possible, if inadvertently a check were to come it should be sent away?

    Mr. RUFF. That's correct.

    Mr. FATTAH. Do you see any distinction between those two policies?

    Mr. RUFF. No, obviously the Congress is free to make its own rules in this area, and the White House policy is designed to ensure that these issues are resolved as rapidly as possible in a way that does not implicate any potential violation of law.

    Mr. FATTAH. Let me yield to the gentleman for a second.

    Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you very much, Congressman Fattah.

    Again, to Mr. Ruff or Ms. Mills, whichever, the Bailey document which we are talking about seems to indicate that the President was interested in integrating the White House data base with the DNC data base.

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    Do you have any reason to believe that integration ever happened?

    Mr. RUFF. Absolutely not.

    Mr. FATTAH. Reclaiming my time, it is interesting because a number of my colleagues who have spoken have spoken out in the past on issues in relationship to some of the allegations that are basically being inferred here, that is to say that the Speaker of the House had a circumstance in which there was an inquiry, an investigation into some of his activities, and he misled the Ethics Committee, but he made a distinction, and many of my colleagues here spoke out publicly on the record that it was a very important distinction in that he did not intend to mislead the Ethics Committee and that was the reason why, in the final hours of that issue, the Speaker was reprimanded and had to pay a $300,000 fine, but people, especially those in his party, stood up and said he didn't intend to mislead the committee and, therefore we should kind of go on.

    There have been circumstances in which, whether it was the videotapes or other circumstances, in which things did not happen perfectly in terms of communications between the White House and this committee.

    Mr. WAXMAN. Will the gentleman yield?

    Mr. FATTAH. Yes.

    Mr. WAXMAN. I think you are making an excellent point and I think we all have to keep things in perspective. If the gentleman will permit, I wanted to yield to Mr. Condit some of the time. He hasn't had a chance to ask any of his questions yet in the last 2 days.

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    Mr. CONDIT. Thank you, Mr. Waxman, and thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will be brief, but I feel somewhat compelled to make an observation, and I do have some questions that I will ask when we begin to ask questions, but, Mr. Chairman, in front of us today are witnesses from the White House Counsel's Office who in some cases have appeared before three or four different investigative bodies. Charles Ruff, deposed by the Senate, testified before the Senate. Lanny Breuer, deposed by the Senate, testified before the Senate, testified before the grand jury. And Cheryl Mills, deposed by the Senate.

    I have just a couple questions and they can be rhetorical questions or you can respond to them if you would like, and, basically, we need to figure out how much is enough? How many times are we going to haul the same people in here so they can repeat what they have already told the other investigative bodies? How much money are we going to spend and waste to do that, and what will we discover that we haven't already discovered in the documents that we have available to us?

    We did this exact thing a month ago with Manlin Foung and Joseph Landon, the very same thing. We hauled them in here. We brow beat them for several hours and we did not learn anything new. Nothing significant came up that would help this investigation, and, Mr. Chairman, if we were serious about doing something constructive and in a bipartisan manner, there is a discharge petition at the well of the House, it has 187 Members who have signed the discharge petition to bring to the floor immediately campaign finance reform. You know and I know it takes 218 signatures to bring it to the floor. I would respectfully call on my colleagues on the other side of the aisle and on this committee to sign the discharge petition and we could have a solution to the problem that we have been discussing.

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    Matter of fact, we have been duplicating our discussions, multiple times, but we can really solve this problem if we could force ourselves to deal with campaign finance reform, and one of the ways we can do that is to put our money where our mouth is and sign the discharge petition and bring about campaign finance reform.

    I felt compelled, Mr. Chairman, to make this point. I have made the same point over and over again. I guess some might say I am being duplicative, but I think someone needs to make the point that these folks have been through this several times, and I think it is just unreasonable for us to continue this and keep them in here asking the same questions over and over again.

    I will yield back to Mr. Waxman.

    Mr. WAXMAN. Thank you very much.

    Mr. BURTON. I won't take any of your time. We will add to your time. I just want to say I will not answer right now. I will at the conclusion of your time, but I appreciate your remarks, Mr. Condit.

    Mr. WAXMAN. We still have time, Mr. Chairman, and we are not yielding back the balance of it because we have other Members who wish to speak. I want to point out the only reason we have to get a discharge petition is because the Republican leadership in the House will not schedule a vote, so the rules of the House allow us, if we get 218, a majority, to sign this discharge petition, we could force it to the floor, but we shouldn't have to do that.

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    Mr. Kucinich, you were interrupted in your questions. I want to yield to you.

    Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. CONDIT. Mr. Chairman, may I have a point of order here? There is a little confusion on my part, too, Mr. Waxman about is this the appropriate time to ask questions.

    Mr. WAXMAN. Yes, it is.

    Mr. CONDIT. I understand that and——

    Mr. WAXMAN. If Mr. Kucinich will allow, I——

    Mr. CONDIT. I will let him continue and then if you have time, come back to me. I do have a couple questions to ask.

    Mr. WAXMAN. I yield to Mr. Kucinich.

    Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    I would like to go back to a point I was asking about before about the handwritten page. I want to ask Mr. Ruff, if that handwritten page presents new evidence that had never before been produced to the subcommittee?

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    Mr. RUFF. Congressman Kucinich, I have to say that I am really not probably in a position to make an expert assessment of that. In my view, it does not add to the core information that had been made available to the committee, that is with respect to the nature of the White House data base. I have to leave it, I guess, to those who are on the receiving end to decide whether they find anything in there that is substantively advancing the cause of this investigation.

    Mr. KUCINICH. Well, Mr. Cox yesterday asked whether the White House Communication's Agency had been given a copy of the letter from Senate investigators and you answered that, and to the best of your knowledge, the letter was not given to the Communication's Agency. Now today you corrected the record.

    Mr. RUFF. That's correct.

    Mr. KUCINICH. And you told us that you learned yesterday after the hearing, one of your staff attorneys, Michael Imbroscio did, in fact, give a copy of the letter to Steven Smith, Chief of Operations, Communications Agency.

    Now I know that some members of this committee may not have read the depositions taken by this committee, but the record should be clear that Steven Smith, in his deposition to this committee a few weeks ago, clearly stated that he had received a copy of the Senate letter from Mr. Imbroscio, so even if Mr. Cox didn't know that, it seems to me the staff could have told him, and so my question is, do you know every single action that every single one of your staff members has taken in the last 2 years in connection with the subpoena compliance?

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    Mr. RUFF. I would never venture to make such a statement, Congressman. I appreciate your making the record clear with respect to the deposition testimony on this.

    Mr. KUCINICH. Do you feel Mr. Imbroscio was doing his job by passing that letter along to the Communications Agency?

    Mr. RUFF. Absolutely.

    Mr. KUCINICH. I yield back, Mr. Chairman.

    Well, while we are at it, I would like to take the opportunity to ask one other question about the cost of the White House data base investigation, because I am very concerned that this might be costly to the taxpayers, and, actually, costing too much money.

    Can you estimate how many hours the White House has spent answering questions about this data base inquiry?

    Mr. RUFF. Perhaps I will consult with my colleague who has been actually through this.

    Mr. KUCINICH. And just one followup question, how much does this cost the taxpayers?

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    Ms. MILLS. Well, in one 3-month period that we were auditing the time and costs associated with it, it was more than $155,000, and that was in a 3-month period. Obviously, we have been working with this matter for over a year.

    Mr. KUCINICH. I might add in conclusion, this doesn't even include the hundreds of thousands that have been spent by the committee on this issue. Thanks.

    Thanks, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. WAXMAN. We have spent over $3 million in this committee. We yield back the balance of our time.

    Mr. BURTON. I would like to respond briefly before I yield to Mr. Horn.

    First of all, two of these witness have not appeared before the Senate, and there have been some depositions taken but they have not appeared before the Senate. And what we are looking at is activities where current law has been broken, and that is the reason why we are not talking about new campaign laws, which is under the purview of the House Oversight Committee, and with that I will be happy to yield.

    Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Chairman, will you yield? You say current laws have been broken. Can you site for us any law that has been broken? There are allegations, but nobody has proved any law has been broken by anyone, as best as I can tell.

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    Mr. BURTON. Well, first of all, the Democratic National Committee has returned questionable contributions amounting to several million dollars.

    Mr. WAXMAN. As has the Republican National Committee.

    Mr. BURTON. No. 2, 62 people at least have either taken the fifth amendment or fled the country. Many of these people are very close to the President. If there is no concern about laws being broken, I would welcome them before the committee. So it is my opinion that laws have been broken. You may differ.

    Mr. Horn.

    Mr. HORN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. Ruff, I am going to ask a series of questions that are related to a request for information by the Subcommittee on Government Management, Information, and Technology, which I Chair. We have had a long-term operation of looking at travel by senior executive branch officials that happened to include the costs of the trip the President took to the Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Asia in November 1996. We first requested information on the actual cost of the trip, almost a year ago, November 26, 1996. The reply, which came from the director of administration, came only after repeated staff calls, and the second letter was sent on January 15, and we never got any specific information on the actual cost of the trip, and we are talking about a trip that ran somewhere between $4.7 million and maybe $5 1/2 million. I did send a letter to you and I realize you weren't there in the initial stages, but I did send a letter to you, as I did to Mr. Quinn and others, on February 25, 1997, asking for compliance with this simple information request. Over 6 months and almost weekly phone calls from our subcommittee staff and its director, Russell George, I have received no reply to this letter.

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    Is there a reason why the White House Counsel's Office has decided not to reply? I might add a footnote that one reply said, well, we will give it to the subcommittee when we give it to the full committee. What you have given the full committee stops, essentially, at October 1996, and, thus, we don't have the data, and what you gave the full committee only reached them because you had a press inquiry.

    Now it sounds to me like press inquiries get first dibbs at the White House, let's give them the information, then when they go to the full committee or one of its subcommittees, they can say this is old news, don't bother me about it. Now I am just curious, how seriously do we take congressional inquiries?

    Mr. RUFF. I can tell you as a basic proposition that we take congressional inquiries very seriously, and we do try to be as responsive as we can be. I also have to confess, however, that I am not familiar with the specifics of your request. I will commit to you that I will make myself familiar with them and I will respond personally to you on this point as soon as I have had an opportunity to learn the background and the circumstances of your request.

    Mr. HORN. Mr. Chairman, I would like at this point simply to put in the record the letter I sent to Franklin S. Reeder, Director of Office of Administration, November 26, 1996, letter to White House Counsel to the President, Jack Quinn, January 15, 1997, and his reply and another reply from Mr. Reeder, which has the estimates but not the actual costs in the letter of February 25, 1997, to the Counsel of the President, Mr. Ruff. I would like it at this point in the record.

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    Mr. BURTON. Without objection, all exhibits, documents, articles and other material referred to by Members today shall be included in the record.

    [The information referred to follows:]

    INSERT OFFSET FOLIOS 82 TO 87 HERE

    Mr. HORN. I have one more question. This is simply to clarify, and it might have been answered when I was out of the room, to Ms. Mills, one of the senior counsels, deputy counsel in the office.

    I gather there is a confusion about when you learned about the White House Communications Agency, and as I understand the record we have in front of us, I am looking at a document of April 8, 1996, from Jack Quinn, Counsel to the President, memorandum for White House staff; I am looking at another one, August 23, 1996, from Jack Quinn, Counsel to the President, memorandum for White House office staff; and the hitch of both of these, which I believe was prepared by you, and your name is in the last sentence on one of them, exclusively, and shared with another member, I assume, of the counsel's staff, Don Sherwa, if I am pronouncing it correctly, and I assume you wrote these memoranda, which would mean you knew quite a bit about the White House Communications Agency, as of April 8, 1996 and of August 23, 1996, and as I understand it your family and you were actually videotaped by them in a tour of the White House on March 11, 1995.

    The query obviously is, is why was the ball dropped on videotapes? You were the most knowledgeable person on the staff. I realize there was a transition, but as I understand it through depositions and everything else a lot of members of the White House Counsel's Office went to you just to ask how things are done because you are the longest serving member, I believe, of the Office of White House Counsel.

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    Now you came in on January 20, 1993; is that not correct?

    Ms. MILLS. I arrived on January 20, 1993. I guess there are several things I would like to try and address to be helpful. First, with respect to the videotape on which I appeared, it was not a tour of the White House, it was a radio address. Second——

    Mr. HORN. I believe you toured with your family, though; did you not?

    Ms. MILLS. No.

    Mr. HORN. Weren't you taking them through the White House?

    Ms. MILLS. No.

    Mr. HORN. OK. Your family wasn't with you?

    Ms. MILLS. My family was with me at a radio address.

    Mr. HORN. OK.

    Ms. MILLS. OK.

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    Mr. HORN. But you were taking them, wouldn't you say radio address is partly touring the White House?

    Ms. MILLS. My family, because they didn't go to a radio address until 1995, and I don't want to quibble with you about this, had had many tours of the White House by that point.

    But with respect to my knowledge of WHCA, as you may know from some of the testimony that has been received over the past several months, WHCA has approximately 900 employees. In dealing with WHCA, their primary function is with respect to telecommunications support of the President. Only seven of the employees deal with the audio visual aspects of WHCA.

    In my dealings with WHCA, we were dealing with issues relating the President's travel, in particular the resources related to that that they provide on the road. On the road they provide staff support in terms of pagers, phones, computers, faxes, beepers, and lots of other materials that the staff use, obviously, to conduct their business. I wanted to ensure that the staff used those resources in a way that was consistent with the Hatch Act, in other words, that they didn't use it for political activity. That was the substance of our discussions and that is what we were talking about with the WHCA personnel.

    WHCA had provided me with their own memorandum they drafted regarding their activities. We didn't discuss the substance of the memoranda. What we discussed was the substance of what activities they performed for the staff with respect to the resources they provided, so I wasn't in a position to know what their practices were with regard to what they videotaped and what they didn't videotape; I simply didn't know. And I think, as I indicated earlier, WHCA's own supervisors did not know what their practices were with respect to what they videotaped and what they did not, so to the extent they responded to a document request and indicated at that time they did not have any responsive material, I would not have been in a better position to know whether or not they had or had not taped the coffees. I hope that is helpful.

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    Mr. HORN. Well, that helps, but isn't it true, then, you knew the videotape operation did exist and when we asked in the subpoena for videotapes, wouldn't that be the first place you would go to ask if they have the relevant material?

    Ms. MILLS. That is what we did, we sent a directive to WHCA.

    Mr. HORN. You did or who did?

    Ms. MILLS. No, I do not—contrary to what might be popular opinion, I am not a part of the investigative team so my day-to-day duties actually involve the other parts of the office. I try to work with the investigative team to try to be as supportive and helpful as I can, but my daily duties are not with respect to the investigative team. Mr. Breuer, who is the special counsel, handles the matters.

    Mr. BURTON. The gentleman's time has expired.

    Mr. HORN. I would like these letters put in the record, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. BURTON. Without objection.

    [The information referred to follows:]

    INSERT OFFSET FOLIOS 88 TO 92 HERE

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    Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Chairman, now that we are under the 5-minute rule, I wish to be recognized for 5 minutes and then I will yield.

    How many times have you been asked that question?

    Ms. MILLS. I've been asked that question at least more than 35 times.

    Mr. WAXMAN. A good use of all of our time and taxpayers' money.

    Mr. Condit.

    Mr. CONDIT. Thank you, Mr. Waxman. Mr. Waxman has actually kicked off my theme here. I would like, if I may, to go to Mr. Breuer. I want to ask you a series of questions, Mr. Breuer, and you feel comfortable to take whatever time you need to answer. I am going to ask most everyone there similar questions.

    Have you been asked for information by any other investigative body or have you testified before any other body?

    Mr. BREUER. I have, Congressman. I have testified before this body, as I am doing now. I have obviously been deposed by this body. I also was deposed by the Senate. I testified publicly in front of the Senate. I testified before the grand jury. I have also publicly spoken about these issues, so I have done it quite a few times just in the last few weeks.

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    Mr. CONDIT. So you have appeared four or five times before the investigative committees or bodies?

    Mr. BREUER. That is correct, Congressman.

    Mr. CONDIT. Have the other requests for information overlapped with the request of this committee?

    Mr. BREUER. They have, in many respects. We probably, in the short time I have been at the White House, since February, we have received approximately 1,100 different types of requests or approximately that. We probably received approximately 300 requests from this committee, many of which do overlap.

    In addition, we are responsible for and try to do whatever we can, Congressman, to make White House employees available for interviews and depositions. Many of the White House employees have been interviewed and deposed more than on one occasion by the Senate and in addition have been deposed or interviewed by this committee, in addition to other investigatory bodies and subcommittees as well.

    Mr. CONDIT. Do you have a count on how many White House employees have been deposed or interviewed by this committee?

    Mr. BREUER. My rough count is—unfortunately, this committee, unlike some other investigatory bodies, has chosen not to go directly through the Counsel's Office, and so the dilemma that I have found that we have is that I don't find out directly when White House people are contacted by the committee. Indeed, the only time I usually find out about it is when there is a problem, and as an attempt at accommodation, we are asked to intercede and help make the process work, something that is very important to Mr. Ruff, and to the President as well. In saying that, probably approximately 50 people have been made available just to this full committee for depositions and for interviews. That is not including the subcommittee by Congressman McIntosh or some of the other subcommittees. It doesn't include any of the depositions or interviews in the Senate.

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    Mr. CONDIT. Has anyone from the White House refused to cooperate or to give information to this committee or any other investigative body?

    Mr. BREUER. Absolutely not. Indeed everyone has agreed to come forward voluntarily. Indeed, I think it is the experience on the Senate side, where the Counsel's Office is present, something that I was hopeful could be done in this committee, something Mr. Ruff as well wanted, whenever there were dilemmas at all or any attempt to ask a question that perhaps might implicate certain privileged or other issues, we found a way of accommodating the need of the Senate committee to get the information it needed, while also preserving the very important institutional rights of the White House. So I would like to take pride in thinking that we accommodated the needs throughout the depositions and interviews, and as far as I know, every single White House person agreed to come voluntarily.

    Mr. CONDIT. Can you estimate for me how much time you have spent responding to this committee's request for information?

    Mr. BREUER. It is hard, Congressman, just specifically to divide up the amount of time we have spent on this committee's request as opposed to all the committees' requests because we indeed received so many and we received so many on a daily and weekly basis. But the 6 lawyers I have had the privilege of working with indeed, more often than not, work 7 days a week and, more often than not, work between 12 and 16 hours. Quite a bit of that time, Congressman, has been in responding to the requests of this committee.

    Mr. CONDIT. Would you say it would be true that most of the topics before us today, you have already addressed most of them with some other body?

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    Mr. BREUER. I think that is fair, that most of the topics addressed today have, indeed, been addressed previously.

    Mr. CONDIT. I would like to go to Mr. Ruff, if I may. I appreciate you being here, Mr. Ruff. Have you been asked for information by any other investigative body or have you testified before any other body?

    Mr. RUFF. Congressman Condit, I have been deposed by the Senate leading up to my testimony of last week, before the Senate, and this is only the second formal open session that I have had the pleasure of attending.

    Mr. CONDIT. Have the requests for information by those committees or bodies overlapped with the request of this committee?

    Mr. RUFF. Substantially so.

    Mr. CONDIT. Could you explain that a little bit for me?

    Mr. RUFF. Well, as is true on the—obviously on the public record, the substantial portion of my testimony before the Senate had to do with the videotapes, which have certainly been a subject of some discussion yesterday and today, as well as more broadly the processes we used for finding documents and other materials in response to committee requests. So those two areas, I think, have been explored in some depth.

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    Mr. CONDIT. Can you give me an estimate of how much time you spent responding to this committee's request for information?

    Mr. RUFF. Well, I would venture to guess that in any given work day, probably close to a half of my waking hours tend to be immersed in document or similar requests or dealing with various other issues relating to this and similar committees. Relying largely on my colleagues to deal with this issue, I nonetheless find myself caught up in it inevitably because I am ultimately responsible for what the office does.

    Mr. CONDIT. Thank you, Mr. Ruff. I see my time has expired. I apologize to Ms. Mills. I know she has similar answers. We documented that. If we have another round, I might get back to her.

    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Could you put the response to those questions in the record, Ms. Mills?

    Ms. MILLS. I will.

    Mr. CONDIT. Thank you.

    Mr. BURTON. Ms. Mills, have you appeared before any——

    Ms. MILLS. I apologize.

    Mr. BURTON. Have you appeared before any congressional committee before today?

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    Ms. MILLS. Yes, I appeared before the Senate, a deposition.

    Mr. BURTON. Did you appear for testimony before any committee before today?

    Ms. MILLS. No. I was deposed in the Senate twice and deposed here.

    Mr. BURTON. I know, but you did not appear in open testimony before today?

    Ms. MILLS. That is correct.

    Mr. BURTON. Mr. Nionakis, have you appeared before any congressional committee before today?

    Mr. NIONAKIS. No, Mr. Chairman, I have not.

    Mr. BURTON. Thank you very much.

    Mr. Shadegg.

    Mr. SHADEGG. I don't believe I have any questions. I appreciate the 5 minutes. I simply want to clarify something. The subject of this hearing today has to do with the responsiveness of the White House in terms of producing documents, that is correct; isn't it, Mr. Chairman?

 Page 205       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    I guess my comment is that I am somewhat mystified by some of the dialog that is going on here. I have heard a discussion all morning about this duplicates the Thompson hearings, witnesses have already appeared before, this is a complete waste of time, and that seems to be a consistent theme we hear on the other side and yet I just heard some comments by a Member on the other side, which said, my goodness, what are we doing going into the White House data base, that isn't the subject of this hearing, the White House data base isn't appropriate, this is all new.

    It seems to me that the White House data base and withholding documents pertaining to the White House data base investigation is very appropriate to our inquiry today. The Senate did not look at the White House data base issue. The White House data base issue is clearly related to the 1996 election and to the overall subject matter of the jurisdiction of this hearing and the hearings we are conducting.

    I am a little mystified. We are criticized for not doing anything that the Senate committee hasn't already done, and then when we do something the Senate committee hasn't already done, we are criticized for not doing something—for doing something the Senate committee hasn't already done, and I just find it mystifying, and it seems to me the White House data base is a very pertinent topic here and we have already brought out very significant evidence about the withholding of information that related to the investigation of the White House data base. It is new material and I think it is very newsworthy and important.

    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

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    Mr. BURTON. Does the gentleman yield back the balance of his time or does he yield to someone else?

    Mr. SHADEGG. I would be happy to yield to my colleague, Mr. Cox.

    Mr. COX. I thank my colleague from Arizona. I would just briefly pick up where I left off with Mr. Ruff on an earlier matter because the time did not permit me to respond to what he said.

    And I want to be straight with you, so that you understand my concern as a former member of the Counsel's Office.

    Mr. RUFF. I appreciate that, Congressman.

    Mr. COX. About the way these things are handled, we were talking about the efforts that the Counsel's Office made and did not make, respectively, to get the videotapes in response to a subpoena.

    And to recap, the subpoena was issued in early March, March 4th, the return date on the subpoena was March 24th, and it was more than a month after that when the first request to offices around the White House went out in writing to return information in response to that subpoena. Is that correct?

    Mr. RUFF. That is true that the first directive went out at the end of April. As you undoubtedly know, Congressman, there were two things at work during that period of time: First, the collection and production and preparing for production of documents collected under the Quinn directives, which had gone out earlier and which covered much of the same territory; and considerable discussion between the staffs, White House staff and the committee staff, about working out procedures and scope of that March 4th subpoena.

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    Mr. COX. My concern is that there was not an internal investigation going on in the White House. It is a lawyer's point, and lawyers argue about these things, whether or not you can stave off compliance with a subpoena. But to not investigate internally, to not undertake that investigation yourself is what concerns me. And that investigation wasn't even commenced internally with respect to any of the things covered by our subpoena, including the White House communications office, until over a month after the return date on the subpoena.

    Mr. RUFF. I don't believe that's accurate. I'm sorry, go ahead I didn't mean to interrupt.

    Mr. COX. It is accurate, is it not, that the first directive went out on April 28th?

    Mr. RUFF. Yes, but you made a broader statement that there was no internal investigation or inquiry or gathering of documents. That is not accurate.

    Mr. COX. Did you, Mr. Ruff, make any written request of the Military Office for White House videotapes prior to April 28, 1997?

    Mr. RUFF. No, but I was trying to respond to your broader comment, Congressman.

    Mr. COX. Well, I'm trying to get us on a specific point which you left hanging before, which is the White House videotapes.

 Page 208       PREV PAGE       TOP OF DOC    Segment 3 Of 22

    Mr. RUFF. Happy to do that. Happy to do that.

    Mr. COX. When I asked you yesterday whether or not the White House, in response to the Senate's written request, homing in on videotapes in August, saying we have a subpoena outstanding, we understand there are videotapes, we understand WHCA makes them, we would like to get an answer from you on this, I asked whether or not you sent anything in writing to the Military Office.

    Yesterday you said you did not. Today you said that you did not, but that a copy of that letter itself was physically carried by an associate member of the Counsel's Office.

    And my concern with your not knowing yesterday and only discovering this today is that it makes it clear that you didn't do any of those things yourself; that you weren't aware of them, as you were, for example, and as routinely the Counsel to the President is aware with any other document request, whether this is a memorandum for the Executive Office of the President's staff from Chuck Ruff, Counsel to the President, re: document request. Initialed by you, it went out because you received a subpoena from the Office of the Independent Counsel.

    But no such writing of any kind at any time went from your office in response to the request from the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee, and that is what concerns me. I want to ask you about your change in testimony between yesterday and today; whether when your staff told you that a staff member had made a copy of the Senate's letter available, whether that triggered a recollection that you had actually known he had done that, or whether you didn't know at any time before that he had done that and that is the first you had learned of it?

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    Mr. RUFF. That is the first I have learned of it, Congressman. And let me just say that, although I appreciate your concern, I'm trying to be responsive to it.

    Let me make two points. The fact is I did not indeed personally talk to WHCA about this, nor did I personally deliver that letter, nor did I personally deliver the directives. I do try to become involved to the point where I have an understanding and an appreciation of the things my office is doing. I delegate a fair amount of responsibility.

    But let me, with respect to this issue of the transmittal of the August 19th letter, make a point. I fear that you were not here earlier when Congressman Kucinich noted that Mr. Smith had specifically testified in his deposition some weeks ago that he had received that letter. So it was a matter of record at least for the committee.

    It was, I regret to tell you, not something I knew yesterday nor did it trigger any recollection on my part once Mr. Imbroscio had advised me of it.

    Mr. COX. That's fair enough.

    Mr. Chairman, I think we have had enough on the point. I simply want to focus on the degree to which the Counsel to the President is in charge of this investigation, the extent to which the White House itself is making efforts to uncover this information, and I think the counsel's testimony that he didn't even know about this until today or yesterday speaks for itself.

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    Mr. BURTON. The gentleman's time has expired. Mr. Davis.

    Mr. DAVIS OF ILLINOIS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. Ruff, we just mentioned the April 28th directive. Is it true that this directive calls for all White House employees to conduct a thorough and complete search of all your records, whether they were in hard copy, computer or any other form?

    Mr. RUFF. That's correct, Congressman.

    Mr. DAVIS OF ILLINOIS. Would you agree or would you assert that the language in that directive is clear?

    Mr. RUFF. I believe it clear and all encompassing, and I think the message it conveyed to the people who received it was exactly what was intended, which is all—capital-letters—''in any form,'' and that is what the people understood who received it.

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