July 18, 1995 - Part 1
July 18, 1995 - Part 1
(09:50:46) Finally, the hearings will address the discovery by White House officials of a torn, undated page of writing by Vincent Foster that was eventually located in his briefcase in the White House office. White House witnesses have maintained that on Monday, July 26, an Associate White House Counsel accidentally found this torn-up note in the briefcase while packing the contents of Mr. Foster's office. But, here again, there is a difference in testimony. There is evidence that at least two White House lawyers actually saw the torn paper in Vincent Foster's briefcase 4 days earlier on July 22 and that they kept this discovery to themselves, The Committee will want to ask when did White House Counsel Nussbaum and his staff first learn of the existence of the torn-up note? Why was the note not discovered during the search that Mr. Nussbaum conducted on July 22 when he opened the briefcase and removed documents from within it? After the note was removed from the briefcase on July 26, why did the White House wait another 24 hours before notifying law enforcement officials? These questions and others will arise during the testimony and documentary evidence presented to the Committee during these hearings. In the final analysis, the Members of the Committee will have to judge whether anyone improperly handled the Foster documents or interfered in the police's investigation during the days following Vincent Foster's death. These are very important questions. We owe it to the American people not to prejudge any facts. We must be fair, impartial and thorough. We must be committed to the pursuit of truth. That's the American way; that's what we intend to do. I'll now turn to Senator Mack. OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR CONNIE MACK Senator MACK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The central question I intend to focus on for the next 3 weeks is going to be why the White House seemed so desperate to get into Foster's off-ice and re 6 retrieve the White-water files and why they can't give us the full story now. In December 1993, they told us that any records taken from Foster's office were made available to Park Police investigators for review. At the same time, they stated that no documents related-to Whitewater were contained in the inventory of items found in Foster's office. Only last week White House officials allowed reporters to review the 71-page Whitewater Development file that officials removed from Foster's office after his death. A White House official said last Tuesday that the file was the only Whitewater material in Foster's office. That's this 71 pages. That was the only Whitewater material in Foster's office. Later last week White House officials began leaking handwritten notes of Vince Foster. They claimed the reason they hadn't given them over sooner was because the notes referred to the Clintons' tax records rather than Whitewater. The White House claimed reporters misunderstood if they thought the White House was showing them every document related to Whitewater that Foster had in his office when they handed over the first 71 pages. They're still only giving us half the story. Let me show you what a partial stack of the real Whitewater file looks like. This is a partial stack. Just a few days ago we were told that this was the entire Whitewater file. These papers were provided to the Committee by David Kendall, the President's personal lawyer, and they only represented a portion of what the White House gave him. He and the White House maintained that we are not entitled to all the files removed; some are privileged. Senator Hatch will get into that issue later. What I intend to explore is the fact that this is much more than just an innocuous set of documents as claimed by the White House. This pile of documents raises some serious questions about why Whitewater mattered so much back then and why it matters now. We have already established that Vince Foster was intimately involved in the Clintons' personal finances and that other White House officials were well aware of this involvement. Those same officials were very concerned that a Federal investigation into Foster's death might uncover the evidence we now possess. That evidence is Vince Foster's handwritten notes detailing his own concerns about a number of things. First, the difficulty of filing truthful tax return, for the President and the First Lady; second, Foster's fear of an audit of the First Couple's tax returns; and third, the First Lady's possible involvement in covering losses at Madison Guaranty,