Bush pledges to fire culprit for leaking CIA agent’s details
His chief political advisor Karl Rove has been held in the firing line after Time reporter Matt Cooper named him as his primary source.
The case has attracted widespread speculation since CIA agent Valerie Plame was named, apparently by Bush administration officials, in July 2003.
Ms Plame was an expert on weapons of mass destruction, whose husband, Joseph Wilson, is a former ambassador who questioned Mr Bush’s claims that Saddam Hussein was trying to buy uranium in Africa.
Mr Cooper wrote in this week’s Time magazine that Mr Rove was the first person to tell him that a critic of the Iraq war was married to a CIA operative.
Mr Bush has sidestepped several questions about his adviser since his name was first touted.
“It’s best that people wait until the investigation is complete before you jump to conclusions,” he said yesterday.
“I don’t know all the facts. I want to know all the facts.
“I would like this to end as quickly as possible. If someone committed a crime, they will no longer work in my administration.”
Mr Cooper has told the grand jury investigating the leak that Mr Rove did not mention Ms Plame by name but did say that she worked at the agency on “WMD”.
He said the conversation ended with Mr Rove saying: “I’ve already said too much.”
The information was backed up by vice president Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, Lewis Libby, he claimed.
The White House has previously denied both Mr Rove and Mr Libby’s involvement in the case.
Some Democrats have called for Mr Rove to be fired, suggesting he violated a law that prohibits the deliberate exposure of the name of a CIA agent.
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