T3 B5 White House Restrictions Fdr- 11-24-03 Email From Roemer Re White House Holding Notes And Memo From Hurley To Zelikow In Response

Philip: Thanks for forwarding Tim Roemer's email. Here's the background: • Early afternoon Monday, Warren and I had just returned to K Street from a morning reading documents at NEOB. Karen came back to Team 3 area and said that Tim Roemer, who was at K Street reading our Foreign Trip memos, wanted to speak with Warren, Scott and I. (Likely, he wanted to speak to all of Team 3, we just happened to be the only ones around, other colleagues were at their respective agencies researching.) • As we were waiting for the impromptu meeting with Tim-he had stepped out to place a cell phone call outside the SCIF--we advised Chris that he had asked to see us. Chris waited for 15 minutes, as he planned to sit in, but because Tim took so long, Chris had to leave, as he was due at NEOB, and the minder over there was waiting. • When Tim returned, Scott, Warren and I met with him to see what was on his mind. He was interested in finding out how Team 3 was doing. We told him we had met with Lee Hamilton 10 days ago and given him an update. We said we were into the heavy interviewing season, and plowing through documents at agencies. • He asked about recent interviews and we mentioned that last week we had interviewed, among others. Hank C., Zal Khalizad, and Lisa Gordon-Hagerty. Tim said he had heard about the Lisa G-H interview and looked forward to reading the memo. That's when Warren advised that the White House, specifically Bryan Cunningham, had withheld our notes. • Tim expressed surprise at this action, and said he was unaware that the White House had the right to keep notes. I told him that we had immediately flagged the issue to Dan, Steve, Chris, and you; and that we received instant and strong support from all of you; in fact, Dan, when he learned of it, got right on the phone with Bellinger (I think? Or one of the other WH legal interlocutors). I told Tim that I thought

Cunningham had been free-lancing in keeping the notes, and that therefore we would get them back quickly. Tim stressed that Commissioners needed to hear about these kinds of problems. I said that the Front Office was fully engaged, and, moreover, I was certain the matter would be resolved favorably to us. In short, I tried to make clear that it was going to go our way, it did not appear to me that it required Commissioner "juice", our Front Office was engaged, and would take it to Commissioners if, in the unlikely event, the WH remained intransigent. (Comment: I thought I had put that genie back in the bottle, but from Tim's note to Commissioners, evidently not.) Warren then advised that he now had in his possession most of his notes (about 85%) but that the WH had kept about 10 - 15 pages. Warren stressed that the notes that were withheld dealt with particularly sensitive issues, and he also said that they were fairly detailed. Tim focused on the portions that were withheld and voiced his concern that we needed to get all the notes back. (Comment: I thought Warren gave a pretty balanced view--at least for Warren—on the note issue. In other words, he was not really trying to "light up" Tim. But Tim pretty clearly seized on the issue.) FYI: In addition to the above, Tim, as he has done in some or our recent encounters at NEOB, expressed strong interest in Team 3's upcoming interviews. He clearly is interested in attending those involving NSC officials (current and former)—Cressey, Simon, Kurtz, etc. He also said that he would like to meet with our Team-the group to also include other interested Commissioners--to go over what we are learning from our research. He is aware of our work on the narrative chronologies and said that he thought such a proposed meeting would be most constructive after our December 1 Roadmap/Chronology session. Philip: Following the session with Tim, I gave Chris a back-brief on what had been discussed, and on Tim's reaction to the notes7 issue. I also filled in Dan M. on Tim's interest and reaction. I regret, and

apologize for, not getting a note off to you, and am sorry you were blind-sided. I had planned to gist it to you in an email this morning. Tim's letter to Commissioners beat me to the punch. • I didn't want you to conclude that Warren was talking out of school. He actually was fairly subdued. I have tried to convey to him that expressing his opinion to the Front Office is fair game, and as you know, he seldom loses an opportunity. I don't' think in this case he went out of his way to stir up Tim. Tim sort of ran with the ball. • Warren is clearly concerned about upcoming interviews, as he is still in the process of taking notes on the Clinton EOF #3 docs, which he obviously would like to master before the round of upcoming interviews. In that regard, when we filled Chris in on our exchange with Tim, Chris made some highly constructive remarks to Warren about focusing on the task in front of him, doing his best, etc.—a message that was timely; one that Warren needed to hear again. I apologize for the length of this note, but wanted you to know the atmospherics of what gave rise to Tim's email to Commissioners. Mike

Mike Hurley From: Sent: To: Cc: Subject:

Philip Zelikow [[email protected]] Monday, November 24, 2003 7:46 PM 'Daniel Marcus'; 'Steve Dunne'; 'Mike Hurley' [email protected] FW: notes

Dan, Steve, and Mike -Wanted to be sure you saw this message from Tim to other commissioners. Mike -- I presume Warren talked to Tim. this.

I haven't received a message from Warren about

Philip

Original Message From: Tim Roemer [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Monday, November 24, 2003 7:28 PM To: 'Gorelick, Jamie1; [email protected] Subject: notes Given that we are all concerned about meeting our deadline and getting access questions behind us, I am deeply concerned about a few problems that need to be resolved right away. We cannot afford any delays, we cannot tolerate more obstacles, we cannot spend alot of time on access questions. It is my understanding that: 1) When our staff conducted a routine interview as part of our regular commission business with an N.S.C. member,Lisa Gordon-Hagerty, their notes were requested and prevented from going back to the office with them. There have never been any restrictions, to the best of my memory, on note taking in our interview process. While we have objected to the "minders" being present, we have not been informed of the "keepers" of notes being part of this process. The staff should not have this restriction imposed on their note taking in interviews, nor should we have the delay in writing up the reports. If this is the process with interviews at the NEOB location, we should not do anymore down there. We should also get the notes back as soon as possible. 2) Warren Bass on team number three still does not have access to very important notes he has taken at the NEOB, which apparently do not conform to the imposed criteria. These notes remain at the NEOB. This needs to be resolved soon. 3) We do not have access to the PDB articles yet.

When will this be addressed?

Maybe I am feeling this growing sense of urgency and impending deadlines!! If my understanding is off-base, let me know. Thanks. Tim