Liar. Liar. Pants on fire.
Time for the presidential prevaricators to stop, drop and roll.
For nearly two years, the Bush administration has lied about its role in throwing three people out of a public, taxpayer-financed Presidential Social Security Forum in Denver.
Friday, in depositions, two White House volunteers charged with unconstitutionally suppressing speech finally explained why Leslie Weise, Alex Young and Karen Bauer were asked to leave before the president arrived.
James O’Keefe, a senior White House advance representative, and Steve Atkiss, then-deputy director of the White House advance office, separately told volunteer Mike Casper to ask Weise, Young and Bauer to leave, Casper testified Friday.
The reason why Weise, Young and Bauer had to go, according to Casper and fellow volunteer Jay Bob Klinkerman, was because others identified the three as having disrupted prior Republican events, said Casper’s attorney, Sean Gallagher.
Gallagher said Klinkerman named Andy Merritt as one of the people who fingered Weise, Young and Bauer. Merritt is Sen. Wayne Allard’s state director and the Republican chairman of the 5th Congressional District.
Merritt denied saying Weise, Young and Bauer had disrupted prior events.
“I was not thinking they were going to kill somebody,” he added.
Merritt said he arrived at the Social Security forum at the same time as a car with bumper stickers that said, “No Blood for Oil” and “Save the Environment, Plant a Bush.”
“Five people got out of the car – two older people and three younger ones,” said Merritt, who until Friday had never revealed his involvement in the scandal, even to his boss. “They split up. The older couple went to one entrance, and the three younger people went to another. They didn’t interact with other people.”
An older couple arrived with the three, Young responded, but in another car.
Still, Merritt told Klinkerman about the bumper stickers and the “suspicious behavior.” Merritt also warned event officials that they “might want to watch” Weise, Young and Bauer.
Behold the Bush administration’s partisan dirty tricks laid bare.
For two years, the president’s press staff, including former press secretary Scott McClellan, blamed this mess on overzealous volunteers. “We welcome diversity of views at the events,” McClellan once said of the Denver Three.
Stop, drop and roll.
“We thought there was a practice and policy coming from the highest levels of the White House to expel people from public events if they disagreed with the president,” said Mark Silverstein of Colorado’s American Civil Liberties Union.
Now, Silverstein said he has the proof.
Atkiss and O’Keefe will be added to a federal lawsuit, Silverstein said.
Martha Tierney, another of Young’s and Weise’s attorneys, said no decision had been made about suing Merritt. Weise, Young and Bauer have denied protesting at earlier Republican events. State Republican officials, meanwhile, had heretofore denied any role in the Denver Three debacle.
“All I did was point out suspicious behavior,” Merritt insisted.
He didn’t need to disclose his role, he added, because nobody cared.
Stop, drop and roll.
Weise, Young and Bauer came to the Social Security forum wearing T-shirts under their clothes that said “Stop the Lies.” They never showed those shirts. They did nothing disruptive. They were shown the door on the suspicion that they might upstage the president.
Atkiss told Denver Post reporter Bruce Finley that this was White House policy.
“We cannot comment on a matter in litigation,” White House spokesman Blair Jones said Friday.
That’s OK; Atkiss did. He told Finley that pre-emptively throwing out potential protesters was necessary to protect the president’s free speech.
Someone needs a lesson in prior restraint. On the other hand, if Atkiss and O’Keefe were merely agents of White House policy, the march up the chain of command can continue.
Silverstein called Friday’s depositions a way to “follow the earpiece” from Casper to the people giving him orders.
Who knows, when Atkiss and O’Keefe testify about their bosses, we might just recognize the names.
Jim Spencer’s column appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday. He can be reached at 303-954-1771, jspencer@denverpost.com or blogs.denverpost.com/spencer.
