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Memo Identified Plame as Undercover

HeadlineJul 21, 2005

Now to the Karl Rove/CIA scandal. The Washington Post is reporting that a classified State Department memo central to the federal investigation into who leaked Valerie Plame’s name as an undercover CIA operative contained information about her in a paragraph marked “(S)” for secret. The Post calls it a clear indication that any Bush administration official who read it should have been aware the information was classified. In the memo, Plame is referred to by her married name, Valerie Wilson. Almost the entire memo is devoted to describing why State Department intelligence experts did not believe claims that Saddam Hussein had in the recent past sought to purchase uranium from Niger, as Plame’s husband Ambassador Joe Wilson asserted after his fact-finding mission to the African nation. The memo was delivered to Secretary of State Colin Powell on July 7, 2003, as he headed to Africa for a trip with President Bush aboard Air Force One. Plame was unmasked in a syndicated column by Robert Novak seven days later. Prosecutors are reviewing the phone records from that trip and have questioned several of Bush’s staffers who were on that trip.

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