White House Placing Pressure On Reno

New strategy aims to head off an independent counsel

By Wolf Blitzer/CNN

WASHINGTON (Sep. 23) -- The White House is going on the offensive in making its case that Attorney General Janet Reno not call for an independent counsel to investigate allegations of campaign fund-raising irregularities.

Sources tell CNN the new strategy is designed to put some countervailing pressure on Reno. Republicans are threatening to begin impeachment proceedings against her unless she calls for an independent counsel.

"People should just give her the space and let her make a decision," White House press secretary Mike McCurry said.

The new posture is in marked contrast to what White House officials have been saying publicly since Reno announced she was formally investigating Vice President Al Gore's -- and possibly President Bill Clinton's -- fund-raising phone calls. Until now, administration officials avoided putting too much public heat on Reno.

"No pressure," said presidential adviser Rahm Emanuel. "I think the attorney general ... this decision is based on the law. The attorney general needs to make that decision that way and needs to be free of political pressure."

But since then, top officials have decided they need to make the case against an independent counsel more aggressively.

Selecting his words carefully, the president denied any wrongdoing on Monday. "I believe what I did and what the vice president did was legal," he said in New York. (416K wav sound)

His aides will now start publicly articulating their interpretation of the 100-plus year old law. They argue the Justice Department has never prosecuted anyone for raising money from people who were not on federal property.

Outside experts say the White House has a good case.

"Remember, the purpose of the law was to protect federal employees from being shaken down by their political masters," says Thomas Mann of the Brookings Institution. "It was not designed to prohibit fund-raising calls from public facilities, since telephones weren't known at the time." (224K wav sound)

The president says he doesn't believe he made any phone calls -- but can't rule it out.

But new evidence has surfaced that he may have made such calls. An October 1994 memo to his former deputy chief of staff, Harold Ickes, suggests that he did call one John Torkelson, seeking $50,000. "BC called" was hand-written on the memo.

White House officials say they still don't know if the president actually made that call. But within two weeks of the memo, Torkelson's company, Princeton Venture Research, did send two $25,000 checks to the Democratic Party.

In Other News:

Tuesday Sept. 23, 1997

• White House Placing Pressure On Reno
• Senate Committee Investigates IRS Practices
• Clinton: Congress Must Consider Campaign Reform
• Daschle Uses Maneuver To Shut Down Committee Meetings
• Fund-Raising Panel Changes Course

E-mail From Washington:
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