Watergate Hearings: Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities June 25, 1973 - Testimony of John Dean.
Watergate Hearings: Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities June 25, 1973 - Testimony of John Dean.
Watergate Hearings: Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities June 25, 1973 - Testimony of John Dean.
Watergate Hearings: Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities June 25, 1973 - Testimony of John Dean.
After this second meeting in Mitchell's office, I sought a meeting with Mr. Haldeman to tell him what was occurring, but it took me several days to get to see him. I recall that Higby got me into Haldeman's office when another appointment had been canceled or postponed. I told Haldeman what had been presented by Liddy and told him that I felt it was incredible, unnecessary, and unwise. I told him that no one at the White House should have anything to do with this. I said that the reelection committee will need an ability to deal with demonstrations, but it did not need bugging, mugging, prostitutes, and kidnappers. Haldeman agreed and told me I should have no further dealings on the matter.
Watergate Hearings: Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities June 25, 1973 - Testimony of John Dean.
I assumed the Liddy plan was dead and that it would never be approved. I recall Liddy coming into my office in late February or early March on a matter relating to the election laws. He started to tell me that he could not get his plan approved and I reminded him that I would not discuss it with him. He stopped talking about it and we went on with our business.
Watergate Hearings: Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities June 25, 1973 - Testimony of John Dean.
I have thought back over the sequence of events and tried to determine if I in any way encouraged Mr. Liddy and his intelligence plans. I am certain of this, I did not encourage him to develop illegal technologies because I was unaware he was developing such plans. Between the meeting in Mitchell's office on February 4, 1972 and June 19, 1972, I had no knowledge of what had become of Liddy's proposal. I did receive a memorandum from Magruder on March 26, 1972 that indicated that Liddy was doing some investigative work for Magruder, but nothing that, appeared illegal. Let me, explain.
Watergate Hearings: Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities June 25, 1973 - Testimony of John Dean.
During the first week of March 1972, Larry Higby, Haldeman's assistant, called me to request for Haldeman any information that Caulfield could come up with regarding the funding of the Democratic Convention in Miami. On March 15, 1972, I forwarded a newspaper article that Caulfield had discovered on the subject. Later that day Magruder brought to me a copy of a memorandum from Liddy to Mitchell regarding an investigation Liddy had conducted using Howard Hunt in Florida. I called Higby and he said that Magruder had already given him a copy. I told Higby that I did not see anything illegal by the Democrats based on the information in the memorandum. I made a notation on the bottom of the memorandum from Mr. Liddy. But I did nothing further and heard nothing further from Higby on the subject. I have submitted to the committee, exhibit 13, the document I have just referred to.
Watergate Hearings: Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities June 25, 1973 - Testimony of John Dean.
I shall now turn to the events following the Watergate incident of June 17, 1972 and begin by telling the committee how I first learned of the incident. I will skip the first part here explaining how I ended up being out of the country when the decision made in late May and returned on the 18th of June from the Far East. I returned from my 4 day trip to the Far East on the morning of June 18. When I landed in San Francisco, after 20 hours of flying, I called my assistant, Fred Fielding, to check in and tell him that I was going to spend an additional day in San Francisco to get some sleep before I returned to Washington. And accordingly, I would not be in my office until Tuesday. It was at this time that I first learned from Mr. Fielding of the break-in at the DNC headquarters. Mr. Fielding told me that he thought I should return home immediately as there might be a problem and that he would fill me in when I got home. I recall that at first I resisted, but Mr. Fielding, who was not explicit at that time, told me I should come back so that he could fill me in.
Watergate Hearings: Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities June 25, 1973 - Testimony of John Dean.
Accordingly, I flew back to Washington and arrived on Sunday evening. I had a brief conversation with Mr. Fielding and he informed me that he had learned from Jack Caulfield that Mr. McCord from the reelection committee was among those arrested in the Democratic National Committee headquarters on Saturday. And also that one of the Cubans that had been arrested had a check that was made out by Howard Hunt to some country club. I recall that my immediate reaction was that Chuck Colson was probably involved. I was truly exhausted at this point so I told Mr. Fielding that I couldn't do any anything at that time and I went to bed without doing anything.