Bush Allows Senate Access to FBI Data on Nominees

The Bush Administration on Friday reversed a decision, made with great fanfare during the contentious Clarence Thomas confirmation process, that severely restricted Senate access to FBI reports on judicial nominees.

In return, the President won agreement from the Senate Judiciary Committee on new rules designed to prevent the kinds of leaks that led to the unprecedented sexual harassment hearing against Thomas, now a Supreme Court justice.

The accord, which cancels the limitations President Bush imposed in October, clears the way for the confirmation of 36 nominees to federal judgeships whose appointments were delayed during the standoff between the Administration and Capitol Hill.

Under the new rules, FBI reports again will be provided but the Senate Judiciary Committee will keep logs of all persons who have access to them or are briefed on their contents. Those who gain access will agree to protect the confidentiality of the reports; aides could be dismissed if they are found to have broken their pledge.

The Justice Department will have the right to approve committee staff aides who have access to the files, and the FBI will conduct background investigations of the aides, as well. Photocopying of FBI reports will be forbidden.

Bush severely limited access to the files last fall after he became angered by disclosures in the news media of sexual harassment charges against Thomas by University of Oklahoma law professor Anita Faye Hill, who had worked for him at two federal agencies.

In a speech declaring that some members of Congress and their aides could not be trusted, the President said then that future FBI background reports on judicial nominees would be shown only to Senate committee chairmen and ranking Republican members and then returned to the FBI.

“Staffs (of senators) will not have access to these reports,” Bush said. “This preserves confidentiality. . . . There is no excuse for leaks that wreck lives and needlessly destroy reputations.”

Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), chairman of the committee, noted at the time that the leaked document in the Thomas case was not an FBI report but an unsworn statement that Hill had provided to the panel considering Thomas’ confirmation.

Since then, both Republicans and Democrats on the Judiciary Committee urged the President to restore the arrangements that allowed senators and key staff aides to examine the FBI reports on nominees for federal judge, U.S. attorney or U.S. marshall to speed the confirmation process.

Without that ability, the senators of both parties said, the committee would have to conduct its own investigations, inevitably delaying Senate approval of the President’s appointees.

Gary Foster, deputy White House press secretary, said the procedural changes were “substantial improvements that will help protect the confidentiality of FBI background reports” on nominees in the confirmation process.

Both Foster and a spokesman for the Judiciary Committee said they were “very pleased” by the outcome of the dispute.