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Subject: 'No Major Fraud, No Massive Corruption, No Rogue Operations'<
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 92 04:44:31 EST
Message-ID: <39.1992Nov19.044432@AmeriCast.com>


Excerpts of memorandum from State Department Inspector General
Sherman M. Funk to acting Secretary of State Lawrence S.
Eagleburger summarizing the findings of the investigation into
the search of Clinton's passport files:<

In a very narrow sense, this special inquiry can be viewed as
"much ado about very little." . .  subverting American foreign
policy.

In a broader sense, however, what we did find was more disturbing
than any of these . . . an attempt to use the records and employ-
ees of a government agency, the U.S. Department of State, to in-
fluence the outcome of a presidential election.

As background: Early this fall, rumors began circulating . . .
about a purported letter to the State Department from Bill Clin-
ton, allegedly written while he was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford.
The letter, again purportedly, indicated that Clinton intended to
renounce his U.S. citizenship, or requested information on how to
renounce his citizenship, or flatly renounced his citizenship. .
. .

If such a letter existed in the files of the State Department . .
. it might well have a profound, perhaps decisive impact upon the
election. If the fact of the letter could be authenticated, the
only action seemingly required was to challenge Governor Clinton
to authorize its release. A "yes or no" answer from Clinton at
that point would be equally disastrous.

 . . . These rumors began to gel in the media in the middle of
September, prompting three Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) re-
quests to the Department. . . . The search of Governor Clinton's
passport files in response to FOIA requests was authorized in ac-
cordance with normal FOIA procedures . . . to determine if they
contain(ed) anything that (did) not violate an individual's right
to privacy and that (might) be released.

 . . . The actions taken in the FOIA office culminated in the
bureau responsible for passports, Consular Affairs (CA).  That
bureau, spurred by the FOIA requests, by congressional correspon-
dence and, at least in some part, by partisan hopes to derail the
Clinton campaign, promoted a search for documents in Clinton's
files of unprecedented scope, urgency, thoroughness, and seniori-
ty of the participants.

The genesis of the search may have been ordinary FOIA requests;
the manner in which it was carried out was anything but ordinary.
. . . <THE SEARCH: DAY ONE<

During the evening of September 30th, three senior employees from
CA - Carmen DiPlacido, Richard McClevey, and Steven Moheban (the
latter a Schedule C employee) - acting under the direct authority
of Elizabeth Tamposi, Assistant Secretary for Consular Affairs .
. . searched Governor Clinton's files. . . .  At Tamposi's in-
struction, Steven Moheban brought the file to Tamposi's home
later that same night. Several of the team were concerned that
something had been torn from a 1976 passport application, and
Tamposi wanted to examine it personally. . . . That night, (Tam-
posi) called several people including the consular affairs off-
icer in London.

 . . . She also called Steven Berry, acting assistant secretary
for legislative affairs. Tamposi had been working with Berry to
reply to an inquiry from Congressman Gerald Solomon (R-N.Y.) re-
garding dual citizenship, and she suspected, based on an earlier
telephone conversation with him, that Berry might be working on
behalf of the White House to get into Clinton's records. . . .
She said she only called Berry to discuss generalities about how
to respond to Solomon's request. Berry, however, said that Tampo-
si told him about details of the search, said that something had
been torn from a passport application, and asked him if he wanted
to see it, something Berry claimed he refused to do. Berry furth-
er said that he and Tamposi had a political discussion that, if
something were found concerning the governor, it would certainly
"get out". . . .

Earlier, while her team was at the (records center), Tamposi
called the White House and tried to speak to (presidential assis-
tant and former State Department spokesman) Margaret Tutwiler
about how to handle the press, should this search become public.
Tamposi also wanted to know if Tutwiler was aware that Steven
Berry was representing himself as acting on behalf of the White
House in this matter. . . . Tamposi did not reach Tutwiler. . . .

Tamposi told John F.W.  Rogers, under secretary of state for
management, about the search. Rogers maintained he was concerned
that anything Tamposi did could be misinterpreted in the charged
political atmosphere prior to the presidential election. He said
he cautioned Tamposi not to involve political (Schedule C) em-
ployees in the search and to ensure that everything she did was
"by the book."  . . .  Tamposi insisted that Rogers never in-
structed her not to involve political appointees; if he had, she
claims she would not have done so.<<THE SEARCH: DAY TWO<

On the morning of October 1 . . . DiPlacido, McClevey, Moheban,
and (Michael) Brennan (public affairs officer for the consular
affairs bureau and a Schedule C employe) spent the day searching
classified and other records for any information on Governor
Clinton, but found nothing. . . .

Shortly after 6 p.m., Tamposi, DiPlacido and Moheban showed In-
spector General Sherman Funk Clinton's passport file and ex-
pressed their concern that something might have been removed from
it. Funk agreed that the matter might be serious and urged them
to secure the file. Instead, DePlacido took the Clinton file to
his home that night. . . . <CONGRESSIONAL/WHITE HOUSE INVOLVE-
MENT<

Although the examination of Clinton's files was officially
launched because of the FOIA requests, congressional interest ac-
celerated the urgency and intensity of the search. According to
Steven Berry, rumors were rampant among Republicans and Democrats
that something potentially damaging to Clinton . . . such as a
letter . . . renouncing his American citizenship, was somewhere
in some federal agency. According to Tamposi, Berry called her on
September 28 and discussed White House interest in a letter of
renunciation of citizenship that Clinton may have written. Tampo-
si said Berry represented himself as working on behalf of Janet
Mullins, assistant to the president for political affairs.  Tam-
posi said that Berry wanted to know if Tamposi could look through
consular files on her own for the letter. Tamposi said she
adamantly refused to do this and became frightened about its im-
propriety and the potential that the White House might be in-
volved. . . . Berry asked Tamposi if she would respond to a
congressional letter. . . . Berry said he would see that such a
letter was delivered.

 . . . Congressman Solomon, in particular, wanted to know and had
been working with Berry to determine how best to obtain access to
Clinton's passport records. Berry freely admitted that he assist-
ed Solomon in this regard and contacted Tamposi. . . . Although
Berry admits he may have told Tamposi about White House interest
. . . Berry maintains that neither Mullins nor anyone else at the
White House was orchestrating such an inquiry . . .  although . .
. the White House . . . would have been extremely pleased if in-
formation detrimental to Clinton had been discovered. . . .

We interviewed one Congressman and eight persons in the White
House, three of them very senior (In total, we conducted 107 in-
terviews). Other than the allegation from Tamposi about Berry's
reference in their September 28th telephone conversation be taken
as conspiratorial, we found no evidence that the White House - or
any other external source - orchestrated an "attack" on the Clin-
ton files. . . .

There is always, in an event such as the search for Clinton's
passport files . . . a tendency to believe that there must be a
correspondingly big and/or sinister cause. We did not find this
here.

What we did find was bad enough: not a carefully thought out con-
spiratorial plan but, rather, a general inability of the system
in the State Department, of the people and procedures that make
up some of the daily operations of the Department, to resist a
kind of ad hoc attempt to politicize a process. This is dangerous
at any time. During a presidential election campaign, in a matter
relating directly to one of the candidates, it could have boiled
over.

We found it encouraging, during our inquiry, to encounter so many
department employees . . . who were outraged by what they had
read about the search of the passport files. We were saddened,
during our inquiry, to realize how easily the department had be-
gun to slide down a slippery slope.<02:29 11-19C9999-----

Copyright 1992, The Washington Post.  This story is from the
Washington Post's Capitol Edition On-Line and is not to be ar-
chived or redistributed.

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