Mr. SCHIFF. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to discuss a matter of great importance to this country--impacting the national security of our Nation, the integrity of our branches of government, and the public trust.
Earlier this week, the Central Intelligence Agency urged the Justice Department to open a criminal inquiry into whether Administration officials leaked the identity of a CIA agent, in order to discredit a critic of the Administration's intelligence claims with respect to an alleged uranium program in Iraq.
Mr. Speaker, prior to the war, the Members of this House were provided with specific intelligence information with regard to weapons programs in Iraq--and this country went to war based on that intelligence. However, we are now learning that some of this intelligence information was seriously flawed, including information that was explicitly featured in a State of the Union address. The syndicated newspaper column that quoted ``senior administration officials'' identifying the undercover CIA operative by name was printed in order to discredit a critic of these very claims.
Disclosure of the identity of a CIA operative is a serious setback to our national security. Such actions also undermine any efforts to candidly assess the intelligence flaws we are now discovering. Because the sharing of classified information by an administration official for political or malicious purposes is such a serious abuse of power, an independent investigation of this matter should be commenced immediately.
As a former Assistant United States Attorney, I had the opportunity to handle both corruption and espionage cases. In my view, we have a clear conflict of interest if the Attorney General and other Justice Department officials are given primary responsibility for the investigation of this potential illegality, because of the alleged involvement of high-level Administration officials.
Such an investigation will not only be difficult to pursue, but the conflict will undermine the results of the investigation, and cause the public to question its result. Rather, this investigation should be pursued by an independent and impartial special counsel appointed by the Attorney General with the full confidence of the public.