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Washington: Former presidential spokesman Scott McClellan on Friday said President George W. Bush has lost the US public's trust by failing to open up about his administration's mistakes and backtracking on a promise to be up front about the leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity.
"This White House promised or assured the American people that at some point when this was behind us they would talk publicly about it. And they have refused to," McClellan told the House Judiciary Committee.
"And that's why I think more than any other reason we are here today and the suspicion still remains."
The former White House press secretary suggested that Bush could do much to redeem his credibility on the Plame matter and his reasons for going to war in Iraq if he would embrace "openness and candor and then constantly strive to build trust across the aisle."
"This is a very secretive White House. There are some things they would prefer not to be talked about," McClellan said.
The White House was dismissive of the event and McClellan himself. Presidential spokesman Tony Fratto disputed McClellan's assertion that the Plame controversy ended with the conviction of Lewis "Scooter" Libby, citing an ongoing lawsuit by Plame and her husband, former ambassador Joseph Wilson, against current and former administration officials.
Meanwhile, the House of Representatives, in an overwhelming bipartisan vote, on Friday approved a sweeping new surveillance law that extends the government's eavesdropping capability and effectively would shield telecommunications companies from lawsuits for cooperating with the Bush administration's warrantless wiretapping program.
Ending a year-long battle with President Bush, the House passed, by a 293 to 129 vote, an overhaul of the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
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