CBS and Fox uncritically reported FBI's claims that CREW failed to provide enough info for Foley investigation
SUMMARY: An article on CBS News' website and a segment on Fox News' Special Report reported the FBI's claim that it did not launch an investigation of former Rep. Mark Foley after the nonprofit group CREW provided the FBI copies of sexually suggestive emails Foley allegedly sent to an underage former congressional page, because CREW refused to provide further information about the emails. Neither CBS nor Fox News, however, gave any indication that they asked CREW to respond to the FBI's allegation. Nor did they note that CREW executive director Melanie Sloan has stated that the FBI never contacted her after she sent the emails and never asked for further information.
UPDATE: CBSNews.com has since updated its October 4 article to include CREW's position. It now reads:
The Justice Department told CBSNews that in July, when Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) provided the "innocuous" e-mails to the FBI, they were heavily redacted. CREW adamantly denies that and says they provided an FBI agent with complete, unredacted e-mails.
The Justice Department also said that the FBI asked CREW to go back to its source and ask for more information so it could follow up, but CREW refused. That's why the FBI, Justuice [sic] said, did nothing further at that time. CREW says the FBI made no such follow-up requests for more information at any time. An FBI agent did place one clarifying phone call on the day CREW turned over the e-mails to double-check that Mark Foley was the congressman involved, CREW said.
Editor's Note: An earlier version of this story failed to present CREW's account. That was a mistake for which we apologize.
CREW released a statement on October 5 regarding the CBSNews.com article, which read, in part:
CBS News has reported that according to the FBI when CREW gave the Bureau the original set of emails from Rep. Mark Foley to a former House page, they were "heavily redacted." The FBI is also claiming that it came back to CREW and asked for more information so that it could follow up, but that CREW refused to provide anything further. Reporters from several other news organizations have repeated this allegation. The FBI is lying.
On Monday, October 2, CREW sent a letter to the DOJ I.G.'s office, attaching exact copies of the emails CREW had sent to the FBI on July 21, 2006. Both the former page's name and the person to whom the page forwarded Rep. Foley's emails were clearly visible. Moreover, after CREW sent the emails to the FBI, CREW's only subsequent contact with the Bureau was one telephone call from the special agent to whom CREW had sent the material confirming that the emails were from Rep. Foley. CREW had no further contact with the FBI.
An October 4 CBSNews.com article, written by CBS producer Beverley Lumpkin, uncritically reported the FBI's claim that it did not launch an investigation of former Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL) after the nonprofit group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) provided the FBI copies of sexually suggestive emails Foley reportedly sent to an underage former congressional page, because the copies of the emails CREW sent "were heavily redacted" and CREW "refused" to "go back to its source and ask for more information." Similarly, Fox News congressional correspondent Major Garrett, on the October 4 edition of Special Report with Brit Hume, reported that an anonymous "senior federal law enforcement official told Fox the emails did not suggest criminal activity and that [CREW executive director Melanie] Sloan's group would not provide information on the source of the emails or the page who received them." Neither CBS nor Fox News, however, gave any indication that they asked CREW to respond to the FBI's allegation. Nor did they note Sloan's statement from October 2, in which she wrote that the FBI never contacted her after she sent the emails and never asked for further information.
According to its website, on October 2, CREW sent a letter to the Justice Department asking why the FBI failed to act after CREW sent the bureau a copy of Foley's alleged email exchange with the underage former page. The version of the exchange available on CREW's website has been redacted to hide the email address and identity of the recipient of Foley's emails. It is unknown whether the copies CREW sent to the FBI concealed the identity of the recipient. However, in an October 2 statement, Sloan stated that she had sent to emails to the FBI and confirmed their receipt, but never heard back from the FBI on the matter:
As a result, after reviewing the emails, I called a special agent in the Washington Field Office of the FBI. I explained what I had received and said that I wanted to pass them along. By email, I then sent copies of the emails to the agent. By telephone, the agent confirmed that she had received them and understood them to be email exchanges between Mark Foley and a young man.
I never heard back from the FBI, but I did not expect to. The FBI cannot share the fruits of its investigation with someone who is not in law enforcement. Nonetheless, I was surprised to learn this morning that the FBI was just beginning an investigation today -- meaning that they had not begun an investigation when I sent them the emails back in July.
Lumpkin, however, in her October 4 article, made no mention of Sloan's statement, nor did she indicate that CBS had even contacted CREW for a response. Lumpkin's own report gives reason to doubt the FBI's interest in moving quickly: According to Lumpkin, the Justice Department didn't get around to sending a "preservation letter" -- requesting "that the House Counsel ensure the preservation in Foley's office of all documentation, computers and electronic files" -- to the House until October 4:
The "preservation letter" that went up to the Hill this morning was signed by U.S. Attorney Jeff Taylor and addressed to the House Counsel. The letter requested that the House Counsel ensure the preservation in Foley's office of all documentation, computers and electronic files.
[...]
In July, when Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) provided the "innocuous" emails to the FBI, they were heavily redacted.
The FBI asked CREW to go back to its source and ask for more information so it could follow up, but CREW refused. That's why the FBI did nothing further at that time.
Garrett's report on the October 4 edition of Fox News' Special Report with Brit Hume featured several statements from Sloan but made no mention of Sloan's October 2 statement and featured no response to the allegations from the anonymous "senior federal law enforcement official":
GARRETT: Meanwhile, an ethics watchdog group that in July gave the FBI copies of Foley's emails to a 16-year-old page charged the Justice Department with dropping the ball by failing to conduct an investigation back then.
SLOAN: That's why I went to the FBI, so they could investigate. Someone had said, well, there was no probable cause to do anything. Well, you don't need probable cause to commence an investigation. All you need is the suspicion that there's wrongdoing.
GARRETT: In the emails, Foley asked for the boy's picture and what he wanted for his birthday. Sloan said the boy's description of the emails as, quote, "sick", unquote, should have provoked a criminal inquiry.
SLOAN: And these emails really shows all the hallmark of an exchange between a sexual predator and a young man who is uncomfortable with what's happening.
GARRETT: The FBI said the matter was under investigation and had no further comments. A senior federal law enforcement official told Fox the emails did not suggest criminal activity and that Sloan's group would not provide information on the source of the emails or the page who received them.
THAT explains a LOT!!
What exactly does it explain?
And your point is what, exactly?
If Media Matters or moveon.org had sent the e-mails to the FBI would that have in any way mitigated the content? It's odd to me that the party of Swiftboat Veterans for Truth would have any complaints about hardball politics. Even if the Dems were behind bringing this revolting Foley matter to light, at least they haven't lied about the subject matter. They don't have to because it is truly repulsive.
your average bully......
Think about it......
A bully plays dirty or lies to outsiders to keep himself from being discovered by those that actually can take away his precieved power, bully's others into submission, beats up on the weak, and gets defensive or backs away when the weak finally decide to fight back.......
The dirty politics is a sick game (both sides are guilty, but even when the Dems were in charge, even at their worst, they didn't compare to todays repuks)...... but play it they do!
I wonder how many repups and/or dems are being blackmailed, in order to keep them 'in line'?
"We the People" are the weak....... we have little to no representation in our government (the corporations have seen to that)
All these have been done to democrats/liberals/ or basically anyone that differs in opinion of those that claim they are in power (we are the party in the minority; or weaker position)
Notice that everytime the dems and/or we 'mythical' little guy finally start to fight back, the repuks get louder and more whinny and more defensive and the lies get more desperate......
All bully's love the power trip and anyone that tries to take it away needs to be taken out, by any means before they are strong enough to fight back properly!
If this doesn't describe the current Repuks today.....I don't know what would......
Can you spell w-h-i-t-e-w-a-s-h, boys and girls? Sure you can! This is the luxury of one party owning all branches of the government; you get to investigate yourself...or not...whatever's convenient at the moment.
I think I was probably too optimistic that this story would have legs. Karl Rove's spin machine already has the Knuckledraggers in the Republican base convinced that this is a Liberal conspiracy. All will be forgotten by November, and they'll turn out in droves to vote Republican so they can be kept safe from turrists.
I think you're waaay too pessimistic. Don't break out the champaign yet but I think the Repubs are about to take a big hit. The right wing spin is preaching to the choir... the 25% or so of the voting population who will eat anything that Rove vomits. "Regular" people, Democrats, Republicans or Independents, are repulsed by this Foley episode and the way the Republican leadership has handled this... and this comes when more and more people have lost trust in George W. Bush himself and his Iraq adventure. Keep the faith...
One has to wonder what the outrage threshold is for the Republican base. There is no question now that Bush and his administration have lied through their teeth about Iraq. What does it take? Are they so frightened that they will forgive any transgression as long as they feel "protected" from turrists? Or, do they just hate Liberals so much that any Republican is better, no matter what he's done?
Unfortunately, there are so many scandals, lies and outrages oozing out or this administration that the public seems unable to focus for any period of time. Because of the Foley scandal, Woodward's book is not getting the attention it deserves.
Indeed, some do... but not everyone who voted for George W. Bush is like that. The extreme right wing Republican base is intractable, though... you could show them a picture of George W. Bush having sex with Dennis Hastert, Mark Foley and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and they would still vote Republican. The best you can hope for those people is that they'll stay home on election day.
She forwarded the emails to the FBI.
"Copies" of the emails that I have seen have the names of the emailers marked out with black marker.
When you forward emails, you cannot black out the 'soft copies', right?
Maybe she took out the header info when she forwarded them.
But she says that the FBI never contacted her back.
So, is she telling the truth, that the FBI never asked for additional info, or is the FBI telling the truth by saying that she refused further cooperation? If she refused further cooperation, could the FBI not have forced her to cooperate?
It makes no sense to assume that the FBI tried to reach her group again. They are trying to cover their asses here. They read the emails, said that those emails were not enough, and they dropped it, and did not look to see if there was further, more damning info out there.
I don't think that it's necessarily bad that the FBI did not go further. Until the IM's came out, it was sleazy what the Congressman did, but not illegal or such a great offense that he had to resign. That's why several other news organizations, when they read the emails, chose to not publicize the story. Those emails were offensive but not enough to indict him, but the FBI could have done further research. They chose to not do any further research, but are not saying that it was not their choice, but was a decision forced upon them because she didn't cooperate, and that's just not believable!
I don't think that it's necessarily bad that the FBI did not go further. Until the IM's came out, it was sleazy what the Congressman did, but not illegal or such a great offense that he had to resign. That's why several other news organizations, when they read the emails, chose to not publicize the story. Those emails were offensive but not enough to indict him, but the FBI could have done further research.
Most importantly, did anyone in the FBI who was an expert in child predator behavior see these?
I can't imagine that anyone who knows anything about how child predators use the internet would not be concerned about the initial emails. Talking about looking good, getting friendly with the birthday stuff, and asking for a photo are textbook for how child predators seduce kids, luring them in to a sense of security.
It's possible that it could be innocent, but certainly is a cause for concern, and needs to be further investigated. However, if the FBI agents don't have enough experience, they might not be able to recognize the signs. In that case, they should invoke the help of someone who could.
Just a quick timeline FOX NEWS and the two GOP leaning Florida papers were informed about the EMAILS and Foley's sleaze reputation in NOV '05. They just sat on it the same way the politico's in the Injustice Department had the FBI sit. Hastert, Shimkus, Boehner, Reynolds and others aided and abetted a child predator... that is intolerable and just another reason why the party I once voted for will go down to a resounding defeat this election.
As usual
It makes me wonder why the media morons didnt' ask the FBI why Sloan refused to go back to the original source. She is, after all the one who brought the e-mails to their attention in the first place and demanded an investigation.
I guess thats why I'm not a journalist. I would have asked.
This makes me feel physically sick. Seriously. The idea that the FBI would lie to the public for any reason makes me truly wonder wht happened to our democracy. Aren't they law enforcement? I truly no longer feel safe.
"Special Report with Brit Hume, reported that an anonymous "senior federal law enforcement official told Fox the emails did not suggest criminal activity..."
Gonzales? If the guy was telling the truth and not doing a Karl Rove a la Flame/Wilson hit job, why not identify himself/herself?