Impeachment Hearings: House Judiciary Committee, July 26, 1974 (2/2)
Impeachment Hearings: House Judiciary Committee, July 26, 1974 (2/2)
[01.03.50] Mr. DRINAN. On June 20,1972, John Mitchell said that the Committee To Re-Elect had no legal, moral, or ethical responsibility for the Watergate break-in. Two days later the President publicly said John "Mitchell has accurately stated the facts. On that same day the President said the White House has had no involvement whatsoever in Watergate. The very next day, however, the President directed Haldeman to get the CIA to head off the FBI investigation. Everyone knows that really the intent to have the CIA tell the FBI that the CIA has an involvement in Mexico was because of the laundered money. The President of the United States had to know about the laundered Money because the checks had shown up and they were traceable to the bank account of Bernard Barker. Mr. Helms, the head of the CIA, told Mr. Haldeman and Mr. Ehrlichman that there was no involvement of the CIA in the Watergate and the FBI can go forward in Mexico and that we have no interest in that matter. But, Haldeman said that he feared that the FBI should not do this and Ehrlichman said that the President himself was concerned about the Mexican money and the Florida bank account. This is the President who 3 days earlier said we have no involvement whatsoever in the Watergate. And at the end of that meeting on June 23, Ehrlichman advised Walters that Mr. Dean would take over in negotiating with the CIA On June 26 Mr. Walters told Mr. Dean that no FBI investigator could compromise any CIA activities. On June 27, Doan met with 'Walters once again, and he had the effrontery to ask the CIA A to deviate from the basic purpose and to pay bail for the people who were involved in the Watergate, and to pay them salaries, And Mr. Walters said I shall not unless the President orders it. And Dean said that Mr. Ehrlichman has approved of it, and Dean went back to Ehrlichman and Ehrlichman said to Dean to push Walters a little harder. And the very next day Mr. Dean summoned Mr. Walters to his White House office, and Dean brought up, the five Mexican checks and the check of Mr. Dahlberg and Dean again asked Mr. Walters to have the CIA stop, the FBI investigation. There is no involvement. We have no specifies? On June 28, Dean and Ehrlichman knew that Gray and Helms were not going to collaborate and they canceled the whole thing. Other specific things happened in that long summer 2 years ago, Dean obtained raw data from Pat Gray on the FBI Watergate in., investigation and Mr. Dean turned that over to the Committee to Re-Elect. Attorney General Kleindienst had refused that information and that information impelled the investigation. Other things happened in that early August of 1972. The President himself asked Mr. Ehrlichman to arrange that Stans not be compelled to go before the grand jury, and that was granted, and similar compromising arrangements were made by the special prosecutor for Colson and Krogh and Young and Chapin and Strachan. They gave testimony before the prosecutors and not before the jury. The only possible explanation is the adoption by the President himself, of a policy to obstruct the investigation of the break-in. I Yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from California Mr. Waldie. The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman is recognized. Mr. WALDIE. Thank yon. Mr. Chairman. Back to the evening of the 20th where the President is having,"". conversation with John Mitchell and they are talking about Watergate, but the Phone unhappily is a phone that is not hooked to, taping system. It is one of those things that happened on the, 20th and we just have to live with those unhappy circumstances. So the only evidence we have of what they really talked about was a dictabelt where the President recorded as was his custom, the events that occurred during the day and on that dictabelt he got to this paragraph and said: "I also talked to John Mitchell, tried to cheer him up a bit. He is terribly chagrined that the activities of anybody attached to his committee should have been handled in such a manner. He only regretted he had not policed all people More effectively in his own organization." And that's another one of those, sad circumstances where then the is a 40-second or 42-second silence on that dictabelt that we have to put up with. But, after that we know then that John Mitchell knew what had happened. There is no question about it that John Mitchell told the President that CRP people were involved. Next day John Mitchell put out a press release saving he deplored that Watergate break-in but fortunately there were' no CRP official people involved, no campaign people. And Ron Ziegler joined in that and said you are right and neither are there any White House people in that third-rate burglary attempt. Now, John Mitchell lied. Everybody agrees. Everybody but John Mitchell, for the record. John Mitchell lied. There were campaign people involved and he knew it. Ron Ziegler lied. Ron Ziegler may not have known it because Ziegler has an ability not to understand many things that occur. But, there -were White House people, Hunt and the President know Hunt was there. Then on the 22d here is the overt acceptance of the President of the plan, the President asked in a press conference what he thought the Watergate burglary, were any members from the White House involved, and he said John Mitchell and Ron Ziegler have told you about that even and they told you the truth and I agree with them. He said there were no White House people involved. he said there were no Committee To Re-Elect the President people involved. There were. He knew about it. At that point he joined publicly, in front of all of the American people, the plan to cover tip as he, of necessity, thought he had to. He could have gone before the American people at that press conference and said it is incredible, this fellow Liddy went to my Attorney General out on the golf course, and told him to bail out these fellows. and I fired the Attorney General because he didn't report it and didn't put Liddy in jail. He could have said. I have been told that there is CRP money involved, that they found down there money from the Committee To Re-Elect the President, I can't believe that. That's beyond my--in fact, you know what I did, I threw an ashtray across the room when I was told that. That's what he could have said if he wanted to tell the truth. The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from Massachusetts has expired. Mr. WALDIE. But he said that there were no White House people and no campaign people involved. The President lied and the President covered up. 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