Bush Refuses to Turn Over Energy Data
A defiant President Bush flatly refused Wednesday to divulge details of internal energy task force meetings to congressional investigators, calling the information privileged and the request a threat to executive authority.
The General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress, sued the administration in February for records of the task force’s meetings. Democratic lawmakers allege Enron Corp. and other energy companies played a disproportionately large role in the task force’s deliberations, whereas environmentalists were largely shut out.
The task force, headed by Vice President Dick Cheney, produced a policy favoring more oil and gas drilling as well as a revival of nuclear power. Cheney’s office has acknowledged that representatives of Enron, Bush’s biggest financial backer in the 2000 campaign, were among the industry experts that the task force consulted.
But Bush insisted that releasing the documents would damage his ability to obtain candid outside advice.
“When the GAO demands documents from us, we’re not going to give them to them,” Bush said.
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