In the News

Louise Radnofsky and Peter Nicholas

President Donald Trump said Friday he has pardoned a former top aide to Vice President Dick Cheney, I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby.

“I don’t know Mr. Libby,” said Mr. Trump, “but for years I have heard that he has been treated unfairly. Hopefully, this full pardon will help rectify a very sad portion of his life.”

Mr. Libby, now 67 years old, was convicted in 2007 of lying to a grand jury and obstructing justice in a case that involved the leaking of the identity of a CIA officer, Valerie Plame.

Mr. Libby was sentenced to 30 months in prison. Then-President George W. Bush commuted the sentence, describing it as “excessive,” but he didn’t issue a pardon, despite entreaties from Mr. Cheney.

Mr. Libby’s conviction capped a four-year investigation by special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald into the leak of Ms. Plame’s Central Intelligence Agency identity.

The White House statement praised Mr. Libby’s record as a public servant and cited an earlier finding from the District of Columbia Disciplinary Counsel that Mr. Libby had presented “credible evidence” in support of his innocence.

Democrats were quick to criticize the action.

“This is a perversion of the pardon power and an instrument for obstruction of justice. The President is sending a clear signal to others that he will reward obstruction of justice. This is a sad moment for our democracy and justice system,” said Rep. Gerry Connolly (D., Va.)

White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said in the statement that Mr. Trump had issued the pardon in part because one of the key witnesses against Mr. Libby had recanted her testimony in 2015, and because before his conviction Mr. Libby had “rendered more than a decade of honorable service to the nation.”

The CIA-leak case began unfolding in the spring of 2003, shortly after the Iraq war started, when the New York Times published an opinion column disputing an assertion by Mr. Bush in the State of the Union address in which he said there was information that Saddam Hussein had sought to buy uranium from Africa.

The column said a former ambassador—which it didn’t identify—had been sent to Niger in 2002 to investigate the allegations and found them false. The ex-ambassador was Joseph Wilson, who is married to Ms. Plame.

In a meeting with New York Times reporter Judith Miller on June 23, Mr. Libby complained about the CIA and their “selective leaking” of information about weapons and Iraq, and mentioned that Mr. Wilson’s wife worked at the CIA, his indictment said.

In 2015, Ms. Miller said in the final chapter of her book that she believed she was induced by then-Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald to give false testimony in Mr. Libby’s trial.

In a news conference in 2005, after Mr. Libby was indicted, Mr. Fitzgerald said the obstruction of justice charge against Mr. Libby was tantamount to throwing “sand” in the eyes of a baseball umpire.

In his memoir, “Decision Points,” Mr. Bush described a tense encounter with Mr. Cheney over Mr. Libby’s fate.

Mr. Bush instructed lawyers to review the case and listen to Mr. Libby. In the end, they told Mr. Bush they could find “no justification for overturning the jury’s verdict,” Mr. Bush wrote. Mr. Bush concluded the jury’s verdict “should be respected.”

As the president’s term of office was winding down, during one of their final meetings, Mr. Cheney asked Mr. Bush to reconsider.

“I can’t believe you’re going to leave a soldier on the battlefield,” Mr. Cheney said.

Mr. Bush wrote that over the previous eight years he had “never seen Dick like this, or even close to it.”

Freddy Ford, chief of staff for former President George W. Bush, said Friday afternoon that Mr. Bush “is very pleased for Scooter and his family.”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-pardons-ex-cheney-aide-scooter-libby-1523640379