Before October 19, 2005: Second Cheney Aide Cooperating with Plame Wilson Investigation

David Wurmser, an aide to Vice President Dick Cheney, begins cooperating with the investigation into the exposure of Valerie Plame Wilson as a CIA agent. This follows the news that another Cheney aide, John Hannah, is also cooperating (see Before October 17, 2005). The news that Wurmser is cooperating comes from sources close to the investigation. He is expected to provide special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald with evidence that the leak of Plame Wilson’s identity was part of a coordinated effort to discredit her husband, war critic Joseph Wilson (see June 2003, June 3, 2003, June 11, 2003, June 12, 2003, June 19 or 20, 2003, July 6, 2003, July 6-10, 2003, July 7, 2003 or Shortly After, 8:45 a.m. July 7, 2003, 9:22 a.m. July 7, 2003, July 7-8, 2003, July 11, 2003, (July 11, 2003), July 12, 2003, July 12, 2003, July 18, 2003, October 1, 2003, April 5, 2006, and April 9, 2006). Wurmser is Cheney’s adviser on Middle East affairs, and formerly served as an assistant to then-Undersecretary of State John Bolton (see May 29, 2003). The sources say Wurmser is cooperating in order to negate potential criminal charges for his role in exposing Plame Wilson’s identity. Wurmser was a key member of the White House Iraq Group (WHIG—see August 2002), the propaganda group that operated primarily out of Cheney’s office. The sources say that in June 2003, Wurmser and Hannah were ordered by their superiors in Cheney’s office to leak Plame Wilson’s name and CIA identity in an attempt to discredit her husband, Joseph Wilson. In 2004, Wurmser was questioned by the FBI for his role in divulging classified national security information to Israel, an investigation that included Hannah and several prominent neoconservatives in the Defense Department. Wilson says: “John Hannah and David Wurmser, mid-level political appointees in the vice president’s office, have both been suggested as sources of the leak.… Mid-level officials, however, do not leak information without the authority from a higher level.” [Raw Story, 10/19/2005]