More Subpoenas, Please

Wednesday, Feb. 07, 1996

A House committee issued 28 more subpoenas to Clinton staffers, including White House aides George Stephanopoulos and Harold Ickes, for documents related to the Administration's 1993 travel office firings. Pennsylvania Republican William Clinger, chairman of the committee, said the Administration is deliberately dragging its feet in releasing documents and called the subpoenas the "only avenue left to ensure that all relevant documents that I have legitimately, responsibly and repeatedly requested are produced to the Congress." Nonsense, countered Presidential spokesman Mike McCurry. "They're running around trying to keep this alive as a political issue. They're more interested in making political hay around these issues than they are in shedding any further light on the truth. That's the bottom line. It's politics." With its search for some 129 subpoenaed documents still stalled by White House claims of attorney-client or executive privilege, the committee is using the other subpoenas to try to force President Clinton's hand.