Washington – The jailing of New York Times reporter Judith Miller on Wednesday put the issue of press freedom and the confidentiality of sources on front pages across the country, but the heart of the case remains what it has been from the outset: whether senior Bush officials broke the law in the disclosure of a CIA covert operative’s identity.
Special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald has spent the better part of two years trying to answer that question, in a case that grew out of the angry debate over whether President Bush and his advisers hyped or falsified intelligence about chemical and biological weapons to justify going to war with Iraq in the spring of 2003.
At issue is whether administration officials misused classified information to try to discredit one of their potentially most damaging critics.
Now, a fast-moving series of decisions over the past week involving Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper has brought a renewed public focus on what role White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove might have played in disclosing the name of CIA operative Valerie Plame.
A White House spokesman long ago asserted Rove was “not involved” in disclosing Plame’s identity. Fitzgerald still appears to want more answers about Rove’s role. The prosecutor is apparently focused on Rove’s conversations with Cooper.
Cooper on Wednesday agreed to testify in the case, reversing his long-standing refusal after saying he had been released from his pledge of confidentiality.
On Wednesday, Rove’s attorney, Robert Luskin, denied Cooper had received a call from Rove releasing him from his confidentiality pledge. Thursday, however, Luskin declined to comment on a Times report that the release came as a result of negotiations involving Rove’s and Cooper’s attorneys.
