Casual Lawbreaking at the White House

"In fact, the White House policy from the first days of the Bush Administration has been clear: use only the official e-mail system for official communications and retain any official e-mails received on a nongovernmental account. A February 26, 2001, memorandum from Alberto Gonzales, Counsel to the President, to White House staff stated: 'e-mail is no different from other kinds of documents. Any e-mail relating to official business therefore qualifies as a Presidential record. All e-mail to your official e-mail address is automatically archived as if it were a Presidential record, and all e-mail from your official e-mail address is treated as a Presidential record unless you designate otherwise. . . . [I]f you happen to receive an e-mail on a personal e-mail account that otherwise qualifies as a Presidential record, it is your duty to ensure that it is preserved and filed as such by printing it out and saving it or by forwarding it to your White House e-mail account.'

"Ms. Ralston's deposition provides evidence that the White House Counsel's office under Alberto Gonzales may have been aware as early as 2001 that White House officials were not complying with the policies regarding preservation of official e-mail. Ms. Ralston told the Committee that she and Mr. Rove twice searched for e-mails on his political accounts in response to investigative requests. Ms. Ralston stated that in 2001, Mr. Rove was asked to search his political computer in response to a request relating to an investigation of Enron. She testified that the White House Counsel's office would have known about these searches 'because all of the documents that we collected were then turned over to the White House Counsel's office.'"

Ralston's Deposition

The House committee's May 10 deposition of Susan Ralston is kind of a big deal for us White House watchers. It is, as far as I know, the first wide-ranging deposition from a key Bush White House aide.

Just how key was Ralston? She was not just Rove's confidential assistant, she was literally his doorkeeper: "When people came to meet with Mr. Rove, did you greet them and bring them in to Mr. Rove?," committee counsel Kristen Amerling asked Ralston.

"Yes," Ralston replied. "I sat just outside his office, so they couldn't get to him without walking past me."

There were a few things Ralston simply refused to talk about without immunity. As Abramowitz writes in The Post: "Ralston's deposition spelled out her interest in obtaining immunity from the committee before testifying on other matters, including the relationship between White House officials and disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Ralston worked for Abramoff before going to work at the White House.

"Ralston's attorney, Brad Berenson, told the investigators during the deposition that Ralston is interested in helping the committee and has 'useful information.' While she does not believe she has violated the law, Berenson said, Ralston 'doesn't have sufficient comfort that testimony provided in this setting on those subjects will not have some tendency to inculpate her, at least in the eyes of someone who is inclined . . . to put the worst possible construction on events.'"

Ralston did, however, answer questions about Rove's use of e-mail -- and about the private briefings on Republican electoral prospects in the last midterm election that Rove's office held for senior officials in at least 15 government agencies covered by federal restrictions on partisan political activity.

Ralston said the briefings typically included a report on "target states."

"Q. When you say 'target states,' what do you mean by that?

"A. There were states that were a priority for political -- for the 0ffice of Political Affairs. They called them 'target states.'

"Q. A priority with respect to what?