"At the minimum, Karl Rove condoned it after the fact, because he continued to speak about it for days afterward as if my wife were fair game," he said.
Rove curtly denied any role in leaking Wilson's wife's name. Asked by an ABC News reporter Monday outside his home in Washington whether he was Novak's source, the top White House aide replied, "No."
At his daily briefing, White House spokesman Scott McClellan also came to Rove's defense, describing as "ridiculous" any suggestions that Rove may have been involved.
"There is simply no truth to that suggestion," the spokesman said. "And I have spoken with Karl about it."
Aside from Rove, McClellan said the White House had no plans to "go down the White House directory of every single staff member and play that game" of asking them if they were the source of the news leak.
The president studiously avoided the controversy Monday. After an afternoon bill-signing ceremony in the Roosevelt Room, Bush ignored one reporter who asked in a booming voice whether the president had identified the source of the information.
Democrats jumped on the story. At least two presidential candidates, retired Gen. Wesley Clark and former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, called for independent investigations.
Leading Senate Democrats, including Minority Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota and Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman John D. "Jay" Rockefeller IV of West Virginia, sent a letter to President Bush and Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft on Monday calling for the appointment of a special counsel to investigate the leaks.
The letter said the lawmakers "do not believe" that the investigation could be handled by the Justice Department because of the "obvious and inherent conflicts of interest involved." But McClellan brushed aside such calls, arguing there was no information -- beyond "media reports" based on anonymous sources -- that links the White House to the leak.
Thus, he indicated, the president had no intention of launching an internal inquiry into the matter. McClellan said that the Justice Department was the proper agency and that the White House would cooperate fully with any such investigation.
McClellan added that Bush regarded the leaking of classified information as "a very serious matter, and it should be pursued to the fullest extent by the appropriate agency. And the appropriate agency is the Department of Justice."
