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Bush's Press Secretary Testfies in Leaks Probe

Bush's press secretary Scott McClelland announced today that he has testified before the grand jury investigating the leak of the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame:

I'm doing my part to cooperate, as the president directed all of us to do," McClellan said aboard Air Force One during Bush's trip to Springfield, Mo.

Now, that's what we call spin.

Update: The New York Times has these details of the grand jury investigation:

In addition to the grand jury appearances, which are believed to include other Bush administration officials, prosecutors have conducted meetings with presidential aides that lawyers in the case described as tense and sometimes combative.

Armed with handwritten White House notes, detailed cellphone logs and copies of e-mail messages between White House aides and reporters, prosecutors have demanded explanations of conversations between aides and reporters for some of the country's largest news organizations that under ordinary circumstances would never be publicly discussed. So far, no reporter has been questioned or subpoenaed.

One set of documents that prosecutors repeatedly referred to in their meetings with White House aides are extensive notes compiled by I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff and national security adviser. Prosecutors have described the notes as "copious," the lawyers said. In addition, the prosecutors have asked about cellphone calls made last July to and from Catherine J. Martin, a press secretary for Mr. Cheney.

In their discussions with White House aides, prosecutors have been careful to avoid signaling their overall theory of the case. Nor have they given hints about who they suspect leaked the information to Robert Novak, who wrote in a Washington Post column last July 14 that the wife of former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, a critic of the administration's Iraq policy, was Valerie Plame, a C.I.A. undercover officer.

....At first, the investigation seemed narrowly focused on trying to identify who at the White House provided the information about Ms. Plame to Mr. Novak. But more recently, prosecutors have focused on a Sept. 28, 2003, article in The Washington Post, which said the newspaper had been told that "yesterday, a senior administration official said that before Novak's column ran, two top White House officials called at least six Washington journalists and disclosed the identity and occupation of Wilson's wife."

Prosecutors, referring to the story as "one by two by six," have sought to learn the identity of the senior administration official or the two top White House officials, believing that whoever provided the information to the Post knew who spoke with Mr. Novak.

Update: Findlaw has a repository of Plame-related documents here.

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