Clinton Tours Midwest, Leaving Crisis Behind Him Former Chief Of Staff Panetta Testifies Before Grand Jury

As President Clinton barnstormed in the Midwest to sell the policies he outlined in his State of the Union message on Tuesday night, his former chief of staff, Leon Panetta, testified before a federal grand jury here Wednesday that he was not aware of any relationship between the president and an intern who once had worked in Panetta’s office.

While Panetta testified, independent counsel Kenneth Starr continued to consider an offer from the former intern, Monica Lewinsky, to testify, in return for immunity from prosecution, about whether she had had an affair with the president and whether Clinton had urged her to deny it under oath.

Lewinsky is claiming Clinton told her at a private meeting late last month that she could testify in the Paula Jones lawsuit that her visits to him at the White House were made to see his secretary, The New York Times reported Wednesday night.

This recent account of the late December White House meeting, two weeks after she was ordered to testify in Jones’ sexual misconduct suit against Clinton, was described by an associate of Lewinsky who has spoken to her, and by others who know Lewinsky’s version of what happened, the Times said.

According to the sources, Lewinsky says Clinton also suggested that she could avoid testifying by being in New York City.

Under federal rules, Lewinsky could not escape complying with a subpoena issued in connection with the Jones lawsuit in federal court in Arkansas simply by living in New York.

Clinton has not provided an account of any discussions he might have had with Lewinsky, a 24-year-old former White House intern who reportedly has said in secretly recorded conversations that she had a sexual relationship with the president.

But in the week since her reported allegations became public, the president has said that he never told anyone to lie, and that he did not have a sexual relationship with her.

Lewinsky’s lawyer, William Ginsburg, said in an interview that he had been told by the independent counsel’s office that prosecutors needed more time before deciding whether to accept the offer for immunity.

“They told us that they are busy, busy, busy,” Ginsburg said. “They are unable to respond to us because of the grand jury work and other work they are doing, and they did not want us to think they were ignoring us.”

He said that Lewinsky was “going nuts over being isolated” and that she had received scores of offers to write books.

Clinton was received enthusiastically by a cheering throng at the University of Illinois in Champaign. “We have had an incredible day,” he declared, his spirits obviously boosted.

The president was introduced by Vice President Al Gore, who, for the first time since the sex scandal erupted last week, forcefully defended him before television cameras.

“He is the president of the country; he is also my friend,” Gore declared, his hands chopping the air and his voice rising to a shout. “And I want to ask you now, every single one of you, to join me in supporting him and standing by his side.”

But the president’s day in the heartland was ruffled when his flight to La Crosse, Wis., where a crowd of thousands awaited him at an outdoor rally, was delayed for hours as his plane became stuck in the mud at the Champaign airport.

Hillary Rodham Clinton was on the road Wednesday too, speaking in Connecticut about child care. Earlier, in a television interview, the first lady continued to defend her husband and asked the public to withhold judgment until all the facts were in.

The day was also marked, however, by legal maneuvering. Wednesday evening it appeared increasingly likely that Starr would subpoena members of the president’s Secret Service detail to testify about his activities and conversations in the White House.

The Treasury Department, the Secret Service’s parent, was preparing a novel legal defense against any such subpoenas, arguing that if the president believed that agents might have to testify about what they had witnessed, he would keep them at a distance, imperiling his own safety.

Inside the Clinton administration, the mood was bolstered by what was seen as a successful address Tuesday night. In his televised speech to a joint session of Congress, Clinton did not mention the crisis surrounding him and his presidency. He declared the State of the Union sound and proposed a series of potentially popular domestic programs in areas like Social Security, Medicare, education and the environment.

Housing Secretary Andrew Cuomo called the speech a turning point for a beleaguered administration, saying in an interview Wednesday that it had “turned down the volume” on the discussion of the president’s difficulties.

“The State of the Union,” Cuomo said, “readjusted the level of discussion and dialogue, and implicitly said: ‘Let’s remember what’s important here. The lives of the American people are more important than the personal life of the president.’ “

Opinion polls taken right after the speech also indicated an improvement in the president’s standing. For example, a poll by the Gallup Organization found that the percentage of people who said Clinton set a bad moral example for the country fell to 47 after the speech, from 61 before.

The results of polls taken immediately after an event must be viewed cautiously and are often not sustained as days go by. But interviews around the country suggested that many people outside Washington were not very concerned about whether the president had had an affair.

“What he does in his personal life, that’s his business,” said Tanya Lieb, a hairdresser who went to greet Clinton on his stop in Illinois.

The response to the president’s speech in the Republican-controlled Congress was less favorable. Republican leaders accused Clinton of wanting to revive the era of big government with vast new spending programs.

Panetta, who was the president’s chief of staff from June 1994 until the end of 1996, was interrogated for almost seven hours by the grand jury investigating Clinton. Lewinsky began her internship at the White House working in Panetta’s office.

Standing outside the federal courthouse here after his interrogation, Panetta said he was unaware of “any improper relationship, sexual or otherwise.”