Commission Head Still Wants Rice Testimony Public

[Robbien]

The Associated Press
WASHINGTON

The independent commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks will not relent in its pursuit of public testimony from the president's national security adviser but is unlikely to subpoena Condoleezza Rice, the panel's chairman said Sunday.

The former chief counterterrorism adviser at the White House, who has criticized the Bush administration's preparedness for the attacks, said he would welcome the attempt by leading Republicans to declassify 2-year-old congressional testimony. The lawmakers hope to show discrepancies between Richard Clarke's recent attacks on the administration's terrorism policies with flattering statements he made as a White House aide.

The White House has asked the commission for a second private session with Rice to clear up "a number of mischaracterizations" of her statements and positions about the attacks. She met with the panel for about four hours at the White House on Feb. 7. But the White House is declining to let her appear at the commission's televised hearings, citing the constitutional principle of separation of powers.

"We will accept any testimony" from Rice, who was "very, very forthcoming in her first meeting with us," said former New Jersey Gov. Thomas Kean, a Republican named by President Bush to lead the commission. "But we do feel unanimously as a commission that she should testify in public. We feel it's important to get her case out there. We recognize there are arguments having to do with separation of powers. We think in a tragedy of this magnitude that those kind of legal arguments are probably overridden," Kean told "Fox News Sunday."

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