September 28, 2003: White House Press Secretary Retains Lawyer for Plame Wilson Leak Investigation

The day after reading a Washington Post article about the two White House sources who alerted reporters to Valerie Plame Wilson’s CIA identity (see September 28, 2003), former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer retains a lawyer. Fleischer knows he is one of the White House officials who disclosed Plame Wilson’s identy to reporters (see July 7, 2003, 8:00 a.m. July 11, 2003, and 1:26 p.m. July 12, 2003), and is therefore one of the White House sources referred to in the article. [Marcy Wheeler, 1/25/2007; FireDogLake, 1/25/2007] According to documents later filed with the government, after reading the article, Fleischer realized that he might end up facing legal charges. A government witness will later state: “And he realized, when there was an ongoing criminal investigation, I don’t want to put words in his mouth, but basically it was one of those moments when your heart goes in your throat, and you think, I could be in very big trouble here. And the following day he obtained legal counsel and began discussing with his attorney what kind of predicament he was in.” [US District Court for the District of Columbia, 1/27/2007]