In the lead paragraph of a March 15 article, New York Times staff writers David D. Kirkpatrick and Patrick Healy reported that the Bush administration had recently challenged plans put forth by “Republican lawmakers” to reform the review process for foreign investment. But they noted later in the article that Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-CT) has backed such a proposal, contradicting their initial characterization of these efforts as exclusively Republican.

Kirkpatrick and Healy's article concerned the current debate between Congress and the Bush administration over the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States (CFIUS), the interagency panel charged with reviewing foreign acquisitions of U.S. assets. CFIUS has come under increased scrutiny since its January approval of a deal to transfer terminal operations at six U.S. ports to a company owned by the government of Dubai, a member state of the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Lawmakers from both parties criticized the panel for failing to conduct a full investigation of the state-owned company, despite what many described as the UAE's mixed record on terrorism. Several lawmakers have since proposed various measures to overhaul or replace CFIUS in order to ensure that security concerns are not overlooked in favor of encouraging foreign investment. CFIUS is currently controlled by the Treasury Department. In a March 14 speech, Treasury Secretary John W. Snow said that the administration is willing to discuss reform but defended the CFIUS process, stating that “national security is our only priority.”

In the lead paragraph of the article, "Bush Official Calls Review for Deals Adequate," Kirkpatrick and Healy wrote that the administration had “pushed back ... against Republican lawmakers' plans to change the review process for foreign acquisitions.” But it is not only “Republican lawmakers” who have put forth such proposals, as Kirkpatrick and Healy later noted:

On Monday, Senator Susan Collins, Republican of Maine and chairwoman of the Senate homeland security committee, and Senator Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut, the ranking Democrat on the committee, introduced legislation to replace the existing review committee with a new committee that would be headed by the secretary of homeland security and include a special role for the director of national intelligence.

Indeed, while Collins is the primary sponsor of the bill -- and Lieberman a co-sponsor -- they jointly proposed the legislation. Moreover, Collins said in a March 14 floor statement that Sen. Daniel Akaka (D-HI) had also signed on as a co-sponsor.