Partisan fight shuts Senate

WASHINGTON – In a rare and surprising move, Senate Democrats stunned their Republican counterparts Tuesday by forcing the lawmakers into a closed session and demanding an investigation into the Bush administration’s intelligence used to justify going to war against Iraq.

“This administration manufactured and manipulated intelligence in order to sell the war in Iraq and attempted to destroy those who dared challenge its actions,” Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said in an emotional floor speech laced with charges that the Bush administration “misstated and manipulated” facts.

Furious Republicans fired back, slamming Democrats for not discussing in “a civil and dignified way” plans to close the session.

For Democrats to “resort to this stunt, this political stunt … is very disappointing,” said Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee, who described the act as like being “slapped in the face.”

“It means from now on I can’t trust Senator Reid,” Frist said.

Democrats complained Republicans have been slow to complete an investigation into the intelligence Bush cited to make a case for war with Iraq. Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., a member of the Select Intelligence Committee, called the lack of action “nothing but foot-dragging.”

Before going to war, Bush told Americans that virtually irrefutable intelligence indicated Iraq had chemical and biological weapons and was working toward a nuclear bomb. No mass-destruction weapons were found, nor was there any proof to the claim that Iraq had tried to by materials for making nuclear weapons from Niger.

Phase one of the investigation, culminating in a 500-page report released in July 2004, found the United States went to war on false claims from a highly dysfunctional intelligence network led by the CIA.

Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., who chairs the intelligence committee, said phase two is approaching completion, possibly within several weeks or less. “You bet we’ve been on phase two,” he said.

Roberts defended the committee’s work on the investigation and called the Democrats’ move an “unfortunate stunt.”

Democrats said they were spurred to act in part because of the indictment last Friday of I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff. Libby was charged with perjury and obstruction of justice in the case involving the leak of the name of an undercover intelligence agent to reporters.

Democrats said the case raised more questions about the intelligence and tactics Republicans used to promote the war.

“We know the intelligence was way off,” said Levin, an expert on Iraq and a prominent critic of Bush’s push for the Iraq war.

Nearly two hours after the session was closed, the chamber was reopened. Frist announced plans to have six senators discuss the progress of the second phase and report back to him by Nov. 14.

Closed door sessions are rare. The last was in 1999 during the Clinton impeachment trial.

Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss., chair of the Rules committee and former majority leader, said while Senate rules allow such proceedings, he questioned why Democrats had not first approached Republican leaders.

“It’s not to say there is not important information that we could discuss … in secret or closed session,” Lott said. “But I’m astounded by this. I don’t really know what the tenor of this is, what is the justification for it, and why this extreme approach was used.”

In what began as a typical day in the Capitol, many senators were just leaving their weekly party policy lunches when Reid took to the Senate floor and blasted the Bush administration for not acting sooner. Several Democrats, including Charles Schumer of New York, Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts and Richard Durbin of Illinois, sat in silence nearby.

Republicans scrambled to huddle in the back of the chamber. After Reid called for the closed-door session, visitors in the gallery, staff and reporters were asked to leave. Within minutes, police stood guard at the doors of the chambers.

Democrats said they had to take the drastic step. “We thought we couldn’t wait any longer to give excuses,” Schumer said. “This is very serious.”

But Republicans chastised their political rivals for failing to warn them. Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., said the tactic had “more to do with settling this political score than anything else.”