Libby Trial: Day Ten

Testimony by Ari Fleischer that Libby disclosed to him the identity of Valerie Plame one week prior to her name surfacing in the press ....

• WaPo: Fleischer Tells Jury That Libby Told Him About Plame:

  "ormer White House press secretary Ari Fleischer told a jury today that Vice President Cheney's former chief of staff disclosed to him the identity of undercover CIA officer Valerie Plame a week before her name surfaced publicly in the press.
  
  Taking the stand as the most critical witness so far in the perjury trial of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Fleischer said that in an unusual lunch in the White House mess, Libby told him that the wife of prominent war critic Joseph C. Wilson IV worked in the CIA's counterproliferation division.
  
  [,,,]
  
  Fleischer said he never viewed the information he received about Plame as classified or secret, because the protocol in the White House was that press aides would be warned explicitly when information was classified and could not be used in discussions with reporters.
  
  Fleischer also made clear how uncomfortable he was when questioned earlier that day at a press briefing about Wilson's claims that the administration was twisting intelligence. Earlier in the spring, he had insisted that President Bush stood behind 16 words in his 2003 State of the Union address about Iraq's efforts to buy uranium in Niger.
  
  But higher level officials he didn't name began suggesting it might be a problem to defend that statement.
  
  "I had been told to be careful not to stand by the 16 words, that the ground might be shifting on that," Fleischer said. "You can't say yes. You can't say no. At that briefing, I basically punted. I said yes and no."
  
  During afternoon testimony, Fleischer told jurors that, a few days after his lunch with Libby, Fleischer had relayed the fact that Wilson's wife worked at the CIA to two reporters while they were covering a trip Bush made to Africa.
  
  According to Fleischer, he passed on the information to the reporters, NBC's David Gregory and Time magazine's John Dickerson, as they were walking alongside a road in Uganda.
  
  The former press secretary said that, in addition to learning about Plame from Libby, he also had just heard another White House aide, then-communications director Dan Bartlett, "vent" about news accounts that Cheney had asked for Wilson's trip. Fleischer said he was in the senior staff cabin of Air Force 1 during the Africa trip when he overheard Bartlett say out loud that Wilson's wife had sent him on the mission to Niger.
  
  He testified that neither Libby nor Bartlett gave him any reason to believe that Plame's employment was classified.
  
  "I never in my wildest dreams thought this information would be classified," he said.
  
  Fleischer, who left the White House in mid-July 2003, said that in September, about 2 1/2 months after his conversation with the reporters, he saw a news account that the CIA had asked the Justice Department to investigate a possibly illegal leak of a covert CIA officer's identity.
  
  "I was absolutely horrified to know I had played a role," Fleischer said. "I thought, 'Oh my God. Did I play a role in somehow outing a CIA officer. . . . Did I just do something that I could be in big trouble for.' "
  
  He said that he hired lawyers and ultimately agreed to be interviewed by investigators after receiving immunity from prosecution."

• Huffington Post: On The Stand: Inner Workings Of The White House Media Machine:

  "Former vice presidential aide I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby's perjury trial continues to expose the inner workings of the White House media machine.
  
  Cathie Martin, the former spokeswoman for Vice President Dick Cheney who last week discussed the preferred White House strategies for beating back negative media stories, returns to the stand Monday."

• Documents From the Trial of I Lewis "Scooter" Libby


• LA Times: Libby trial shows unsealed lips in CIA


• Firedoglake: � Libby Live: Cathie Martin, Four


• Firedoglake: � Libby Live: Ari Fleischer One


• Firedoglake: � A Peek Inside The Media Circus


• Firedoglake: � Libby Live: Ari Fleischer Two


• Firedoglake: Libby Live: Ari Fleischer Three


• Firedoglake: � Libby Live: David Addington


• Firedoglake:� B-I-N-G-O

Technorati tags: Libby, Plamegate, CIA Leak Case, Patrick Fitzgerald, Joseph C. Wilson, Washington Post, Ari Fleischer, news, commentary