Secret Service Must Testify
A federal judge Friday ruled Secret Service agents can be compelled to testify before a grand jury in the Monica Lewinsky investigation, rejecting Clinton administration arguments they had a special privilege.
The decision is the latest in a string of legal victories for Whitewater prosecutor Kenneth Starr, who is trying to overcome several obstacles to his effort to investigate an alleged presidential affair and cover-up.
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One source familiar with the ruling said Judge Norma Holloway Johnson granted Starr's motion seeking to compel a small number of Secret Service employees to testify.
In so doing, the judge rejected the Clinton administration's effort to argue a novel legal theory that Secret Service agents must have a special "protective function privilege" to avoid testifying before grand juries about things they observe while protecting a president.
Starr had argued that no such privilege exists in the law.
The decision leaves the administration with several choices, including an appeal or a change in legal strategy: the president could still invoke executive privilege to try to stop the agents from testifying.
The ruling, expected to be made public later Friday, is another in a line of rulings over the last month in which Johnson has sided with the prosecutor. Earlier, she rejected the president's efforts to use executive privilege to block the testimony of two key aides. The White House plans to appeal.
And she has ruled that Lewinsky's lawyers did not have a binding agreement to grant her full immunity in exchange for her testimony. An appeals court declined to reverse that ruling.
In a rare public hearing just a week ago, Johnson signaled her skepticism about the Secret Service's arguments. "I don't see it," she said of Justice Department and Secret Service claims that a president could be harmed, even assassinated, if he didn't enjoy absolute secrecy from the agents protecting him.
Starr had argued that "absolutely nothing supports" the agency's claim that a new protective function privilege shields its employees from answering certain questions.
"The testimony of certain Secret Service personnel is highly relevant" in this case in determining whether "one or more persons may have engaged in illegal acts including perjury, obstruction of justice and intimidation of witnesses," the prosecutor said.
Justice lawyers raised the prospect that a failure to ensure the ful confidence of those protected could therefore lead to lax security and result in an assassination.
Requiring the Secret Service testimony would damage "the trust and the confidence of the president in the ability of the Secret Service to step in and protect the president against assassination," the department argued.
At issue are three Secret Service employees whom Starr wants to testify. Their names have not been released publicly.
Starr is investigating whether Mr. Clinton lied under oath in the Paula Jones sexual harassment lawsuit and encouraged Lewinsky, a former White House intern, to do the same in exchange for helping her to find a job and a lawyer.
Both Lewinsky and the president have testified under oath that they did not have a sexual relationship.
Written by John Solomon