[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 94 (Wednesday, July 15, 1998)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1313]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   STARR SUBPOENAS THE PRESIDENT'S MEN WHO STAND IN THE LINE OF FIRE

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                         HON. JOHN CONYERS, JR.

                              of michigan

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, July 15, 1998

  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, today we have learned that the Independent 
Counsel Ken Starr has issued a new subpoena for the testimony of 
Special Agent Larry Cockell, a plainclothes Secret Service officer who 
is in charge of the President's personal security detail. This new turn 
in Mr. Starr's endless investigation raises an important question: why 
didn't he subpoena this plainclothes agent earlier this year before he 
went to court over whether the Secret Service should give confidential 
information to the grand jury.
  Perhaps Mr. Starr was concerned that the court might take a different 
view of his arguments against the Secret Service's privilege if it knew 
the full scope of his intentions with respect to questioning the Secret 
Service. It is disturbing that two courts have had to examine the issue 
of a secret service privilege without being informed that Mr. Starr 
also intended to question plainclothes Secret Service agents in 
addition to the uniformed Secret Service agents.
  Plainclothes Secret Service agents are unique in that they enjoy 
intimate access to the President and are responsible for his physical 
safety in public crowds and other places where the risk of harm is the 
greatest. In the event of an assassination attempt, they are truly in 
the line of fire.
  Seeking to question those agents raises a different set of issues 
which the courts have not yet been confronted with. Mr. Starr's latest 
subpoenas frustrate the orderly judicial resolution of the important 
issues raised by his unprecedented requests for the testimony of 
uniformed Secret Service agents.
  The Secret Service argument in support of a privilege against 
testifying seems more reasonable than Starr's argument that the 
attorney-client privilege did not survive the death of the client. In 
both cases, there was little available precedent and the arguments were 
based on policy considerations. If Starr's attorney-client privilege 
argument was not frivolous and deserved Supreme Court review, it must 
be said that the Secret Service's sincere arguments in support of their 
protective function is just as legitimate.
  It seems Mr. Starr is determined to deny the Secret Service the same 
opportunity for Supreme Court review that he has sought for himself. He 
has already forced the Secret Service to seek a stay of his subpoena in 
court while it pursues its request for judicial review.
  It has been reported that Starr may ask Secret Service personnel to 
testify about conversations between President Clinton and his attorney 
Robert Bennett concerning the Paula Jones case. This would create a 
potentially tragic Catch-22 situation in which the Secret Service has 
an obligation to guard the President, but Mr. Starr argues that their 
presence eliminates the President's attorney-client privilege. It is 
unreasonable, unfair and unprecedented for Mr. Starr to force the 
President to compromise his Secret Service protection in order to 
receive confidential advice from his private attorney.
  To its credit, the Secret Service strongly believes that their duty 
to protect the President is far more important than Mr. Starr's inquiry 
into what any of them may or may not have witnessed in the course of 
carrying out their responsibilities.
  It is unseemly and inappropriate for Mr. Starr to continue to force 
the Secret Service to forego the judicial review that it believes is 
absolutely appropriate in order to carry out its mission of protecting 
the President. Mr. Starr got to go to the Supreme Court on his 
privilege issue and he lost. Why doesn't the Secret Service, which is 
trying to protect the life of this and future Presidents, get to go to 
the Supreme Court? What Mr. Starr is trying to do with this latest 
subpoena is to get the testimony he wants before the arguments about 
privilege can reach the Supreme Court. This new subpoena is a tactical 
maneuver to avoid the full judicial review of these issues of enormous 
national importance. They are legal maneuvers that violate a 
fundamental sense of fairness and are really unnecessary to the 
execution of his statutory responsibilities.
  It is obvious to everyone that any further review will be handled in 
an expeditious manner, just as the courts have already done. A fair-
minded prosecutor would welcome a complete Supreme Court review of the 
privilege asserted by the Secret Service and efforts to thwart such 
review only serves to increase the doubts that many have about the 
legitimacy of this investigation.

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