There’s plenty of ways to examine the the Intelligence Identities Protection Act and the Espionage Act, but there’s that the old adage: the cover-up is sometimes worse than the crime. In this case, the cover-up may not literally be worse — leaking classified information is pretty atrocious — but it may be what sparks indictments.
A former Justice Department official who talks frequently to people involved in the case said signs point to special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald focusing on the aftermath of the leak rather than the disclosure.
“I think he made his decisions months ago that there wasn’t a crime when the leak occurred,” said the former official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “Now, he’s looking at a coverup: perjury, obstruction of justice, false statements to an FBI agent.”
A few discrepancies have emerged in public statements about the case, offering clues to potential contradictions being examined by the grand jury. Cooper wrote in his Time account of his grand jury appearance that “a surprising line of questioning had to do with, of all things, welfare reform.” But Cooper wrote that he “can’t find any record of talking about it with him on July 11, and I don’t recall doing so.” Rove has maintained that the conversation was initially about welfare reform, according to a lawyer familiar with his side of the story.
Indeed, this sparks all kinds of possibilities. Once we step outside the legal guidelines of “knowingly” leaking an undercover CIA agent, and start exploring what White House officials did to minimize the scandal, the opportunities for indictments flourish. As Salon’s Tim Grieve noted, “You don’t have to be a leaker to be a liar.”
Did Karl Rove lie about his involvement in the leak when he appeared before the grand jury or when he spoke with federal investigators? Did Rove or Scooter Libby obstruct justice when they told — if they told — Scott McClellan that they weren’t involved in the Plame leak? Was McClellan obstructing justice when he spread stories about the case from the White House press room — stories that we know now to be false? And where was Dick Cheney, anyway?
Good questions, all. If Fitzgerald wants to pursue criminal charges, and everything from his career suggests he does, the good news is he won’t have to look far.