WASHINGTON — The White House on Friday appeared to confirm that President Bush had authorized a leak of classified information about pre-Iraq war intelligence, describing the release of such information as beneficial for the "public interest."
The statement came the day after disclosures in court documents that the White House, despite Bush's frequent criticisms of leaks, secretly provided material to a reporter in early July 2003. The government did not announce declassification and publicly release the material for another 10 days.
"There were irresponsible and unfounded accusations being made against the administration, suggesting that we had manipulated or misused that intelligence [in order to justify going to war]," White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan said. "Because of the public debate that was going on and some of the wild accusations that were flying around ... we felt it was very much in the public interest that what information could be declassified, be declassified. And that's exactly what we did."
McClellan on Friday repeatedly said the release of the material was intended to inform public debate about the war. But the controversy has reignited long-standing complaints that the Bush White House uses intelligence data for political advantage -- particularly in making the case for invading Iraq and then defending the war in the midst of the 2004 reelection campaign.
Some Democrats said the leak was part of an administration pattern of "selective disclosure" -- releasing information to support its arguments and rebut its critics while guarding data that could prove embarrassing or politically damaging.
On Friday, Rep. Rush D. Holt (D-N.J.), a member of the House Intelligence Committee, called on the Republican leadership to demand that Bush explain in person to Congress "the leak of extremely sensitive intelligence for purely political purposes."
The document that Bush personally declassified, a summary of the so-called National Intelligence Estimate, was provided to counter the claims of an administration critic.
Former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV had been sent to Africa by the CIA in 2002 to investigate administration claims that Iraq was seeking to purchase nuclear materials -- claims he said were unfounded.
Wilson later charged that the administration had "twisted" intelligence when it said Saddam Hussein's attempts to get uranium from Niger were proof that he was trying to rebuild his nuclear weapons program.
