Karl Rove Escapes Indictment

Posted on June 13, 2006

In the surprise of the day it was announced that Karl Rove has managed to escape being indicted in Plamegate.

Top presidential aide Karl Rove will not be indicted in the CIA leak case, according to Rove's lawyer. Special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald had questioned Rove about his role in the public revelation that Valerie Plame had been an undercover CIA agent.
Rove's lawyer says Fitzgerald has formally told him that Rove will not be charged. Already under indictment is former White House aide Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Cheney's former chief of staff. The news, which came in a letter to Rove's attorney, lifts a cloud from over the White House. It should also allow Rove to focus on the Republican Party's efforts to maintain its congressional majority in the November elections.
Libby, who will go on trial in early 2007, is accused of deliberately lying to the grand jury about his involvement in leaking the name of CIA operative Plame, whose husband, Joe Wilson, had publicly disagreed with the White House over its Iraq strategy.

So, Rove got away with outing one of our covert agents during wartime? What a great message to send to our enemies.

Fitzgerald isn't talking -- he's keeping mum as usual. And Rove's attorney says he didn't cut a deal. So no one really knows why the matter was dropped after such a lengthy investigation. Ambassador Wilson's attorney dropped some strong hints that the Wilsons are going to sue Rove in civil court over his outing of Mrs. Plame as a CIA agent. That certainly worked in the O.J. Simpson case. O.J. walked in the criminal case, but the Brown family sucessfully sued Simpson in a civil case.