An August 21 Washington Times article about a statement issued by Sens. Carl Levin (D-MI) and John W. Warner (R-VA) reported that "[t]he White House since July has highlighted gains ahead of a Sept. 15 progress report to Congress from Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, U.S. commander in Iraq." But the assertion that Petraeus will give a “Sept. 15 progress report to Congress” is false. As Media Matters for America has noted, the 2007 supplemental funding bill for the Iraq war requires that President Bush prepare and submit the report to Congress, after receiving input from senior foreign policy and military officials, including Petraeus and U.S. ambassador to Iraq Ryan C. Crocker. As an August 15 Los Angeles Times article reported: “Despite Bush's repeated statements that the report will reflect evaluations by Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, administration officials said it would actually be written by the White House, with inputs from officials throughout the government.”

The U.S. Troop Readiness, Veterans' Care, Katrina Recovery, and Iraq Accountability Appropriations Act, 2007 provides that "[t]he President shall submit" a “report to Congress not later than September 15, 2007,” assessing the status of 18 benchmarks for the Iraqi government “and declaring, in his judgment, whether satisfactory progress toward meeting these benchmarks is, or is not, being achieved.” The bill also provides that the Unites States ambassador to Iraq and the Commander of Multi-National Forces in Iraq will be available to testify “prior to the submission” of this September report. On August 20, The Hill reported that Petraeus and Crocker “likely will testify before Congress” on September 11 “in open hearings” where "[t]hey will answer lawmakers' questions about the situation in Iraq, the success of the troop surge and the next steps to be taken."

As Media Matters noted, the Times article also falsely claimed that in a speech a day earlier, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) said the Bush administration's so-called “surge” policy is “working.”

From the August 21 Washington Times article:

“It's working,” Mrs. Clinton said of the troop surge yesterday in a speech at the Veterans of Foreign Wars national convention in Kansas City, Mo., a group at odds with her votes for a pullout and against emergency troop funding.

[...]

The White House since July has highlighted gains ahead of a Sept. 15 progress report to Congress from Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, U.S. commander in Iraq. In his weekly radio address Saturday, Mr. Bush predicted political progress at the local level in Iraq will help end the stalemate at the national level.