A tentative congressional deal to create an independent commission to investigate the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks fell apart hours after the White House and House Republican leaders objected to the plan, sources said last night.
Commission backers questioned whether the White House was trying to scuttle the panel privately while endorsing it publicly and planned a news conference today to air their complaints and push again for approval.
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"I worry the White House may try to run the clock out as we near the end of the session and might not be as supportive of this concept as they have indicated," said Rep. Timothy J. Roemer (D-Ind.) after a House-Senate conference on this year's intelligence authorization bill broke up without agreement on the commission proposal.
Earlier in the day, three of the four top leaders of the Senate and House intelligence committees, which are conducting a preliminary investigation of their own, announced they had reached agreement on a plan and said a fourth, House intelligence committee Chairman Porter J. Goss (R-Fla.), had signaled his approval.
They acknowledged there were still some points of disagreement with the White House, which other sources said included the scope and duration of the inquiry, the composition of the panel and subpoena powers. But they said they believed administration officials would ultimately go along. The White House initially opposed the idea of an independent commission but reversed last month and endorsed it just as the Senate was about to approve legislation to create the commission.
The negotiators planned to add the commission proposal to the intelligence authorization bill, which is on a fast track for approval, before Congress recesses for the Nov. 5 midterm elections. But, when House and Senate conferees met later to ratify the accord, they were told that House Republican leaders would not bring the legislation to the full House for a vote if the commission proposal was included as written. "Clearly, it was because of [White House] objections," said a congressional aide.
As approved by the Senate and endorsed by the negotiators, the new probe -- conducted by a 10-member commission of private citizens -- would have a far wider focus than the probe by a joint congressional panel into intelligence failures. The panel would look into provisions involving aviation, diplomacy, immigration, border control and the flow of assets to terrorist organizations. In an attempt to satisfy the White House, negotiators agreed to two chairmen, one appointed by the president and one chosen by the Democratic congressional leadership.
"This commission will be our best hope for discovering the unvarnished truth about how Sept. 11, 2001, happened," said Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.), a leader in the fight for creation of the new panel. It is being proposed "not so we can lay blame but so we can do everything possible to make sure that nothing like Sept. 11 ever happens again," he added.
The proposal languished earlier this year but gained new momentum after the joint committee turned up evidence of intelligence failures in dealing with terrorist threats. The Senate last month approved the proposal, 90-8. The House earlier approved a narrower plan limited to intelligence issues.
