Leak Prosecutor: 'It's Not Over'
Special prosecutor
Fitzgerald spoke to reporters at the Justice Department, following the indictment of Vice President Cheney's chief of staff,
CBS News chief White House correspondent John Roberts reports that Fitzgerald wants to know why Rove didn't tell the grand jury about a telephone conversation with Time reporter Matt Cooper in which he identified CIA agent, Valerie Plame. Rove's legal team hopes to convince the prosecutor it was an honest omission.
Libby resigned Friday after he was indicted by a grand jury, accused of obstructing its investigation and lying about an effort to blow the cover of Plame.
CBS News legal analyst Andrew Cohen reports the indictment "makes it very likely, almost a certainty" that Cheney will have to testify in the criminal trial against Libby.
If so, Cheney, who prizes secrecy, will be called upon as a witness to explain why the administration launched a campaign against Plame's husband, diplomat Joseph Wilson, a critic of the war who questioned Mr. Bush's assertion that Iraq had sought nuclear material.
Wilson, who spoke to 60 Minutes correspondent Ed Bradley in his first interview since Libby's indictment, said that his wife has been threatened.
"There have been specific threats [against Plame]. Beyond that, I just can't go," Wilson tells Bradley.
Libby became the first high-ranking White House official in decades to be criminally charged while still in office. Rove was spared from criminal charges for the time being.
Cohen said that for Rove, the president's right-hand man, it was a day of relief tempered by angst.
"Fitzgerald's investigation into the disclosure of the identity of a CIA agent is not over, and Rove and his lawyer know it, and now both have to contend with the idea that Libby, who presumably talked with Rove regularly about things large and small, now has great incentive to share whatever he hasn't already shared with Fitzgerald and Company," Cohen said.
Libby wasn't indicted specifically for the leak, but Fitzgerald left little doubt that he believed Cheney's top aide learned Plame's classified identity from the CIA, State Department and his own boss and then revealed it to reporters.
"It's important that a CIA officer's identity be protected, that it be protected not just for the officer, but for the nation's security," the prosecutor said. "Mr. Libby was the first official known to have told a reporter."
CBS News correspondent Gloria Borger reports that for Cheney, Libby's resignation is a loss, but some say its not a fatal blow.
"My sense is that although he has enormous regard for Scooter Libby and vice versa, that the relationship is not quite as central to his political life as the relationship of the president to Karl Rove," said former congressman Vin Weber.
Cheney said he accepted the resignation with regret because Libby is "one of the most capable and talented individuals I have ever known."
Though Cheney was one of the officials who told Libby about Plame's secret work for the CIA before it was leaked to reporters, Fitzgerald said he wasn't alleging any wrongdoing by the vice president.
"I'm not making allegations about anyone not charged in the indictment," he said.
Libby's attorney, Joseph Tate, promised to vigorously challenge the charges.
The 22-page indictment was the latest blow in one of the darkest weeks of the Bush presidency, which also saw the 2,000th U.S. military death in Iraq and the embarrassing withdrawal of Harriet Miers as Mr. Bush's Supreme Court nominee.
the Special Counsel's statement (.pdf).
Mr. Bush, whose approval rating is near the lowest point of his presidency, praised Libby's years of government service but acknowledged the "ongoing legal proceedings are serious."
"In our system, each individual is presumed innocent and entitled to due process and a fair trial," the president said.
Fitzgerald's investigation is nearing an end, and the grand jury he used for the past two years expired Friday. But he declined to address Rove's fate. The prosecutor is still weighing whether to charge Mr. Bush's closest adviser with false statements, lawyers said.
Friday's charges stemmed from a two-year investigation into whether Rove, Libby or any other administration officials knowingly revealed Plame's identity in summer 2003 to punish her husband, Joseph Wilson, for his criticism of the Bush administration's use of prewar Iraq intelligence.
In the end, like so many other Washington scandals, prosecutors zeroed in on an alleged cover-up.
Libby, 55, was charged with five felonies alleging obstruction of justice, perjury to a grand jury and making false statements to FBI agents. He could face a maximum of 30 years in prison and $1.25 million fines if convicted.
Fitzgerald suggested that proving Libby lied to the grand jury would be an easier case to make than showing he intentionally revealed a secret officer's cover. Specifically, the prosecutors alleged Libby concocted a false story that he got Plame's name from reporters and passed it on to others when in fact he got the information from classified sources.
"Mr. Libby's story that he was at the tail end of a chain of phone calls, passing on from one reporter what he heard from another, was not true. It was false," the prosecutor said. "And he lied about it afterward, under oath, repeatedly."
The closest to bright news Friday for the White House was the word from Rove's attorney that the presidential confidant was not being indicted along with Libby.
Fitzgerald has been looking for weeks at whether Rove gave false testimony during his four grand jury appearances. Rove's lawyer waged a furious effort in recent weeks to convince the prosecutor that any misstatements were unintentional or were corrected.
"The special counsel has advised Mr. Rove that he has made no decision about whether or not to bring charges," attorney Robert Luskin said. "We are confident that when the special counsel finishes his work, he will conclude that Mr. Rove has done nothing wrong."
Libby's indictment paves the way for a trial that could renew the focus on the administration's faulty rationale for going to war against Iraq — the erroneous assertion that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction.
Libby is considered Cheney's alter ego, a chief architect of the war with Iraq. A trial would give the public a rare glimpse into Cheney's influential role in the West Wing and his behind-the-scenes lobbying for the war.
Democrats suggested the indictment was just the tip of the iceberg. Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said the case was "about how the Bush White House manufactured and manipulated intelligence in order to bolster its case for the war in Iraq and to discredit anyone who dared to challenge the president."
Hoping to contain the damage, some Republicans distanced themselves from Libby. Others said the legal system should run its course.
"It's time to stop the leaks and spin and turn Washington into one big recovery meeting where people say what they mean and mean what they say," said Rep. Jim Ramstad, R-Minn.
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., said through a spokesman that the Senate won't investigate the CIA leak.