Clinton Apologizes for FBI Files on GOP

President Clinton on Wednesday offered his first direct apology for the White House retrieval of FBI files on high-level Republican officials, pledging to correct a flawed system and saying: “I believe the FBI will correct it as well.”

Clinton, under GOP attack for alleged abuse of power over the confidential files, told an afternoon press conference with European leaders that he would “never condone or tolerate any kind of ‘enemies list’ or anything of that kind.”

The White House disclosed last week that officials of an office responsible for controlling access to the executive mansion had obtained at least 330 files from the FBI, including those of such GOP notables as former chief of staff Kenneth M. Duberstein, former Secretary of State James A. Baker III, and Tony Blankley, spokesman for House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.).

While Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole and others have insisted that the purpose was “dirty tricks,” Clinton asserted again Wednesday that “it appears to be nothing more than a bureaucratic snafu, based on all the evidence I have seen. . . . There is no evidence to the contrary.”

He said he knew “nothing about it beforehand.”

Clinton’s handling of this issue may come under special scrutiny since he pledged in 1992--when Bush administration officials were found to have investigated his student passport application--that he would dismiss anyone in his administration who did something similar.

He promised that he would have more answers when he receives the results of a review that he said is underway by the FBI and the White House counsel’s office.

That inquiry, headed by FBI general counsel Howard Shapiro, is expected to lead to a call for much more tightly controlled procedures for seeking FBI background reports and for providing them.

Administration officials said that Shapiro’s report is likely to recommend that the FBI require clearance by higher-level employees before background files are sent to the White House and to urge that officials making the requests provide more verifiable data on why the information is being sought and by whom.

The report also probably will recommend that the information request form itself include an explicit statement on the penalties for improper requests, the officials said.

As the inquiry has proceeded, a lawyer for a White House official who was closely involved in the security operation offered more details on how the security office could have mistakenly sought FBI background files on officials long gone from White House service.

The lawyer said that, based on conversations with a former White House official involved with the process, the errors grew from inaccurate Secret Service lists of the people who were entitled to access and needed security clearance.

Errors crept into those lists in part because presidents routinely take personnel records with them when leaving office.

When Presidents Carter, Reagan and Bush left, White House officials of the new administrations were left with incomplete knowledge of which past employees and occasional White House visitors required access and background checks. Because of this, White House security officials in the Reagan and Bush administrations also sought FBI files that they did not need, according to the lawyer.

In addition, he said, errors crept in because of flaws in the operation of two Secret Service data banks.

One data base included people with regular access--so-called “hard pass” holders. And a second data base included those pass holders and hundreds of others who were given a lower level of security clearance but still required some access to the White House grounds.

The White House’s computer access system was supposed to expunge names when White House employees left the government. But it did not always do so, according to this explanation.

And sometimes the two data banks did not communicate properly, keeping names on the Secret Service list that should have been expunged.

But a former White House official who was closely involved in credentialing during the Bush and Reagan administrations disputed that the change of administrations had caused gaps in information that had led officials to mistakenly order FBI files.

“We always had up-to-date lists,” this official said.

Anita McBride, director of the White House office of personnel from 1987 to 1992, also strongly disputed the claim that outdated lists were a problem in those years.