Dr. Foster Case Tests Credibility of White House

The White House on Tuesday broadened its investigation into the abortion record of Surgeon General-nominee Dr. Henry Foster Jr. as rising criticism from Congress began to transform the issue into a question of Clinton Administration credibility and competence.

Stung by criticism that his White House initially gave Congress faulty information on Foster’s abortion history, President Clinton vowed that he would stand by him in the face of opponents’ claims that he had ended hundreds of pregnancies. Foster maintains that in private practice he has conducted no more than 12 abortions, most to safeguard the health of mothers.

But in the newest sign of their lack of confidence in their President, many House and Senate Democrats assailed White House handling of the nomination and voiced fears that Clinton would abandon in haste yet another controversial nominee.

In a sarcastic jab at her frequent ally, Rep. Patricia Schroeder (D-Colo.) said that she and fellow Democrats were sending Clinton bottles of spray starch in hopes of strengthening his resolve.

Rep. Louise M. Slaughter (D-N.Y.) called it “deplorable” that Clinton would allow the issue of abortion to intrude by answering questions about the number of procedures the Tennessee obstetrician-gynecologist had undertaken.

The National Right to Life Committee charged Tuesday that Foster had headed a study in the early 1980s that gave at least 59 women an experimental drug to enable them to induce their own abortions. Administration officials sought to downplay that study, saying that it was old news and had been disclosed by Foster.

In a dangerous sign for the nomination, Sen. Nancy Landon Kassebaum (R-Kan.), who chairs the Senate Labor and Human Resources Committee, said that--because FBI background checks on Foster are only beginning--confirmation hearings are not likely to begin until mid-March. That delay is likely to give opponents ample time to organize opposition.

The nomination already is proving embarrassing to the President because of what it suggests about flaws in White House management--flaws that Clinton and aides have labored long and visibly to correct.

In failing to pin down the abortion record of an obstetrician-gynecologist, the White House seemed to show that its political antennae are hardly keener now than they were in Clinton’s first year when he backed away from a series of Justice Department nominees--including Zoe Baird, Judge Kimba M. Wood and C. Lani Guinier--whose views or actions made them too hot to handle.

It appeared that the fundamental White House miscalculation was its belief that, given the divisions in the Republican Party over abortion, Republicans would not focus on Foster’s involvement in abortion and instead would look at the appealing aspects of Foster’s record in fighting teen-age pregnancy and in leading Meharry Medical College in Nashville.

Administration officials believed that Republican attacks on Foster would “create a huge chasm,” one senior Administration official said. He also said that Foster was not to blame when the White House erroneously told Kassebaum that Foster had conducted only one abortion, and it was for “therapeutic” reasons.

“He never lied to us,” the official said. “He hid nothing from us.”

Much about the nomination and Foster’s background remained unclear Tuesday.

White House Press Secretary Mike McCurry said that, while a large group of aides is now immersed in an “exhaustive and complete analysis” of Foster’s record in preparation for nomination hearings, the White House still is unclear about the 1978 transcript that abortion foes claimed showed that Foster had conducted 700 abortions.

The transcript, purportedly from a hearing of the Ethics Advisory Board of the former Department of Health, Education and Welfare, identifies a “Dr. Foster” as saying “I have done a lot of amniocentesis and abortions, probably around 700.”

McCurry said that Foster acknowledged attending the hearing but said that he had made it very clear that the statement did not accurately reflect his record.

Clinton, asked Tuesday about the transcript, said he believes questions about Foster “have been cleared up and I certainly support him.”

One sign of the White House concern was the decision to put Erskine Bowles, deputy chief of staff, in charge of determining the facts. Bowles is overseeing a crisis-management team that has sent some aides to Tennessee to pin down facts that Foster has said he only vaguely remembers.

The team, which also includes officials of the Department of Health and Human Services, interviewed Foster at the White House on Monday evening.

Officials said that, while the White House took charge of Foster’s prenomination background check, it asked only generally about abortion--though specifics were likely to come up in the debate over his nomination, given the superheated controversy surrounding the issue.

Echoing a widely expressed sentiment among Democrats, Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) said Tuesday that he faulted the White House for not having laid out all the potentially damaging information to members.

In the House, about 20 Democrats called a news conference to back Foster and to urge Clinton to stand by the nominee.

Rep. Nita M. Lowey (D-N.Y.) declared: “Frankly, the number of abortions that Dr. Foster performed is irrelevant.”

The nomination has put Democrats in a painful situation. They will take political heat if they support a nominee who is later withdrawn. Yet they also would be uncomfortable backing away from a nominee that they and many others would strongly back.

Privately, many congressional Democrats were in agreement with Sen. Trent Lott of Mississippi, the Republican whip, who fumed: “Why do they keep going to these nominees that have these problems? They’re either not checking them out closely enough or they’re thinking they can slip them through or something.”

Predicting that the nomination is in serious difficulty, Lott acknowledged that the Administration’s actions had “caused problems for us too,” because the GOP would prefer to focus on such issues as the line-item veto and the balanced-budget amendment.

Kassebaum said the White House had “badly mishandled” the nomination, and lamented that Foster had been put on the spot when views on abortion should not be the sole test of a prospective surgeon general’s fitness.

One Democrat close to the White House said that the “real pity” of the controversy is that, if the Administration had handled the issue better, anti-abortion opposition to Foster could have turned into a political plus for the President. “Most people are with him on this,” said the Democrat. “He could have demonstrated his resolve.”

The withdrawal of Foster’s nomination also would be embarrassing for the White House because of its eagerness to place more blacks in top positions. The White House has come under criticism for the dwindling number of blacks in its senior ranks.