Isikoff reports Powell took CIA dossier which detailed Plame's role at CIA

[flpoljunkie]

on a trip to Africa with President Bush. I am waiting for the transcript from Inside Politics to post it. Thought this was very interesting to be dropped into the conversation on Rove possibly outing of Valerie Plame as CIA operative.

Remember Joe Wilson wrote his New York Times op-ed on Sunday, July 6, 2003.

Transcript up: http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0507/11/ip.01.html

CROWLEY: Right. So what we are seeing here it looks like is some pushback from the White House, going, well, wait a minute, first of all, it's not right that the CIA send him. His wife sent him over there. So it could be something...

ISIKOFF: But the problem that people in the White House, Rove among them, may have is how did they know that Valerie Plame, or Wilson's wife worked at the CIA? What we do know is there was a classified State Department report that said this, that was taken by Secretary of State Powell with him on the trip to Africa that President Bush was then on, and many senior White House aides were on.

That classified State Department report appears to have been -- or may well have been the source for the information that Rove and others were then dishing out to reporters. And if that's the case, there still may be -- we don't know yet, but there still may be an instance where classified information was provided to reporters.

______________

Found article about the Africa trip they were mentioning. Check the date!

Novak's article written on July 14, 2003. Rove spoke with Cooper several days prior.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2003-07-13-bush-africa-voters_x.htm

Posted 7/13/2003 9:47 PM 

Strategists hope Africa trip boosts Bush's standing with black voters

By Laurence McQuillan, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — President Bush's five-nation trip to Africa last week was part of his subtle courtship of black Americans, a political constituency seldom wooed by Republican presidents. State Department and White House officials consider the trip an important diplomatic mission. GOP political strategists see it as a journey that could improve Bush's standing among African-Americans while highlighting centrist themes that also appeal to moderate whites.

The trip to Senegal, South Africa, Botswana, Uganda and Nigeria stressed the "compassionate" aspects of Bush's "compassionate conservative" agenda. His main themes: fighting the pandemic of AIDS, encouraging economic growth and protecting the world from terrorism.

Bush's return to the White House late Saturday ended a visit that began Tuesday with a tour of Senegal's infamous Goree Island, where slaves were shipped to the Americas. "The stolen sons and daughters of Africa helped to awaken the conscience of America," Bush said, setting the tone of his trip.

<>Secretary of State Colin Powell, who was with Bush in Africa, says the visit should not be viewed as a political exercise with black voters in mind. "It was designed to deal with real problems facing people in need in Africa," Powell said.

[DURHAM D]

1. Is there a way to find a list of reporters on the airplane with

Bush, Powell and Rove ?

[flpoljunkie]

20. Google? Wilson op-ed 7/6/03, Africa trip week of 7/7, Novak's column, 7/14

There should be any number of stories written about this Bush/Powell African trip.

[Renew Deal]

2. So did Bolton request the record on behalf of Colin Powell?

Is that what that means?

[notadmblnd]

3. was rove on that trip too?

or did the president spill the beans to rove?

[notadmblnd]

4. rut roh.. the document is gone

not the document.. the story from USA Today

[flpoljunkie]

5. Try it again now. It does not seem to last.

Salient part is included.

[bananas]

7. works for me

This one? Works for me, try again.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2003-07-13-bush-africa-voters_x.htm

[HootieMcBoob]

6. Okay...maybe it did start with Bush

If Bush had access to the information or was briefed about it and was told that Plame was Wilson's wife, he may just have been stupid enough to have told Rove about it and even suggest that he try to use her to discredit Wilson. He's enough of a vindictive punk to do it.

We know that Novak not only knew that she worked at the CIA but in his own words:

"Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction. Two senior administration officials told me Wilson's wife suggested sending him to Niger to investigate"

So, someone told Novak that she was an "operative on weapons of mass destruction".

He not only knew that she worked at the CIA but what her specialty was! And he was told by two senior administration officials!

I pray to God that this exposes not only this administration but the whole conservative movement and the infrastructure that they've build over the last 30 years for what it is and that the whold house of cards comes tumbling down.

I want it to be an embarassment for anyone to have ever been associated with these people. I want the names of Bush and Rove and Cheney and all of the rest of them to become synonomous with corruption and treason.

[ProudDad]

9. They already are

They're just the extension of the Nixon/Reagan/Bush/Bush admin...

A subsidiary of the Barry Goldwater/Curtis LeMay wacko brigade of 1964.

:nuke:

[DURHAM D]

13. Good perspective. Thank you. eom

[Uncle Joe]

54. Exactly who could possibly be two senior administration officials

in relation to Rove?

[gratuitous]

8. Well, if St. Colin is implicated

It might explain a lot of the press reticence in discussing this. Powell is a secular saint for the insiders and the elites.

[remfan]

10. WOW! That'a a huge piece of information!

Blows my theory all to hell, but it explains so much. It certainly explains why the Air Force One phone records were subpoenaed.

:bounce:

[flpoljunkie]

11. Very interesting that Air Force phone records subpoenaed. Had forgotten.

[tibbiit]

12. Isnt that the Africa trip

Where they watched Elephants screwing Elephants?

As a metaphor for what is starting... hehe
tib

[calimary]

61. Yep, that's the one.

Watching elephants fuck each other. Never realizing it was a metaphor for things to come...

[Ugnmoose]

14. This is big folks!

Isikoff is definitely starting to connect some dots. He is digging to the heart of the case...who fed the information to Rove? You can rest assured Fitz knows about the CIA dossier, which is why he subpoened the White House Air Force One communications log. You know he strongly suspects that the info came right from the top. The big question is can he prove it. Here is another little tid bit to chew on. I remember reading somewhere that there were at least two witnesses to the Grand Jury that testified that Bush knew about the leak. And right after that testimony Bush got lawyered up. So we know someone has spilled some beans on Chimpy's plate. Folks what we have here is a good old barn burning conspiracy and my bet is that it will go right to the top of the food chain.

[flpoljunkie]

15. Yet, Isikoff has not mentioned this African trip again since his initial

CNN INSIDE POLITICS appearance yesterday. Isikoff was on HARDBALL AND COUNTDOWN and again this morning on CNN's Early Morning Edition right before 7AM.

No one asked him about it and he did not volunteer the information, as he did on CNN. Perhaps he is saving it for a further article on Newsweek.

I would think he would want to get out right away the question, how did Karl Rove know that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA at all?

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

51. "What did the President know, and when did he know it?"

It's always the cover-up that gets 'em.

[skip fox]

53. Here's how I see it. Rove is a cooked turd blossom.

Rove Will Go Down In Plames

A logical analysis of the foundational story:

All data suggest the positive: one or more indictments for Rove and at least one more for another "high administration official," resulting to a loss of Republican credibility as the party of high morality and personal responsibility.

We know there were 6 calls because 6 contacts were reported made (Miller, Cooper, Novak, Pincus among them). We know 3 contacts confirmed their stories with another "high administration official."

Therefore

1.) 1 man (named Rove by Cooper) made all 6 calls (which reduces the contention that he "unknowingly" provided Plame's identity laughable). But he would also have had to make sure that there were a few other "high administration officials" ready and willing to confirm his story, which means "coordination" (see how I'm avoiding "conspiracy"?). Did Rove act as a mastermind telling others his informatin and letting them know they should confirm it if asked before "unknowingly" releasing Plame's identity 6 times? Was this coordination "unknowing" as well? What does "knowing" mean? Repeated deliberate acts and coordinating with others for future support suggest strong and clear intentions. It has "knowledgeable design," maybe even creative, written all over it.

or,

2.) more than 1 person (Rove and at least one other) made the 6 calls. (The fact that one source released Cooper from his agreement of confidentiality but one source did not release Miller suggest at least 2 sources.) Then Rove would have more to coordinate! To establish guidelines like: No source should call another's contact, Pitch the information in an off-hand manner, not as the main subject, Make the contact think the source is trying to do him or her a favor ("Don't go too far out on this Wilson thing, I don't want you burnt."), etc. AND Rove would have had to field a group of officials to support the sources' stories as above.

I say Rove coordinated because it is obvious he did so since anyone in the administration in possession of the Plame-Wilson-CIA link would have gone straight to the world master of deceitful politics, and now we know Rove was at least one of the leakers.


So, in the first case we have at least 2 indictments for Rove (exposing and conspiring to expose) and (perhaps) 1 or more indictments for others (confirming and condoning the exposure while furthering it).

But in the second case we have at least 2 for Rove (same as above, but more evidence of conspiracy) and 1 or more clearcut indictments for others (both leakers and confirmers for exposure).

And then we haven't even begun to ask the question of how Rove got the information. (Doesn't leaking the information to him also constitute a crime?)


There are probably a great many other issues. Perhaps Miller gave her source the Plame identity as some reports suggest. Perhaps all the reporters confirmed their stouries multiple times. It is likely that other federal laws have been violated in the use of classified material for political purposes. Etc. But the baseline is probably in #1 or #2 above.

[bklyncowgirl]

16. What did the president know and when did he know it?

Bush is a nasty piece of work. I would not be shocked if blowing Plames cover was his idea.

[NoFederales]

17. Thanks; great thread

Keep 'em coming--wonderful mood lifters after so many downers.

NoFederales

[Cocoa]

18. Isikoff is carrying water for the neocons

maybe Isikoff's source on this is Scooter Libby, who has an obvious motive in dragging Powell into this.

[pgh_dem]

27. Maybe...or maybe he's pissed that he got burned on the Koran toilet

story.

Could go either way, but he sure didn't seem like a water-carrier on Countdown last night.

[KoKo]

34. Agree, don't trust Isikoff. He spins for t he Bushies and the Neocons.

He made his reputation on what Linda Tripp leaked to him. He made money off the Blue Dress. We have to hope that there are folks besides Isikoff that can redirect what's coming out and use him.

Powell was not popular in that administration. On the other hand Isikoff's leaking that to Crowley would alert Powell.

Who knows...so many crooks and liars and spinners. :shrug: But, the truth is out there, and this isn't Bill Clinton's time. There's so much info that Isikoff can spin away and he can get caught.

[Zen Democrat]

48. The Neocons just crapped all over Isikoff and Newsweek

on the "flushing the Koran down the toilet" story. Have you forgotten how the WH accused Isikoff and Newsweek of the death and violence in Afghanistan?

Isikoff may be returning the favor to Karl Rove.

[KoKo]

56. The "NeoCon's" might be covering for Isikoff though.

:D Maybe I'm :tinfoilhat: or have read too many mysteries in my life but I will NEVER trust Isikoff. The spin from the Bushies who are Masters goes way back to Poppy and Reagan. So...that's why I wear my :tinfoilhat:

I hope you are correct...but I won't bet on it...but understand what you say in that you are hopeful. I no longer have that innocence. :-(

[calimary]

62. This may just be it. "Isikoff may be returning the favor..."

I'll bet he WAS firmly on the reservation, a valuable "asset" ever since he proved himself to the bad guys by his role in the persecution of Bill Clinton. But when the White House turned on him and left him hanging out to dry with the Koran-flushing affair, perhaps that's when he decided his loyalties were severely - um - "misplaced." Thus burned, he decides to dish some of it back at them... Look, someone who went so hard and heavy on the whole sordid Linda Tripp and stained blue dress mess must must be regarded as suspect in terms of upstanding ethics. Why it seemed to become almost a personal obsession with him ought to hoist a red flag out there for somebody. I find it disturbing. So I find HIM disturbing, especially in view of how HEAVILY he went after Clinton for lies about a frickin' blow job, but hasn't batted an eyelash crosswise at any of the myriad sins, scandals, transgressions, and illegalities committed by this bunch. SO only NOW he's even coming close to doing his job on a scandal that's TRULY substantive, as opposed to some private pecadillo with a voluptuous backstage girl.

I think Isikoff's ego got stuck in its proverbial zipper and he's feeling personally betrayed. And now that it's personal...

Hey, whatever. If something like this is what it takes to start the cookie crumbling, I'll salute it!

[HootieMcBoob]

19. Why hasn't this been nominated for the Greatest Page

at the very least three times?
This is important information!

[flpoljunkie]

21. Perhaps title not sexy enough.

I hope Isikoff will write more about this--and soon!

[Lochloosa]

22. Done HootieMcBoob

[HootieMcBoob]

23. Excellent Work

:toast:

[flpoljunkie]

24. Thanks, Hootie.

[flpoljunkie]

25. Thanks, Lochloosa.

[Tesla]

26. They still act as if.............

How dare you ask us questions....
You, You , Un-American!!!
Nominated and Kicked!!

[berni_mccoy]

28. Things are truly heating up in this case...

Feels a lot like Watergate...

[BeFree]

29. Yep, even to the uninformed, once they get wind of it

Did relate the case to a friend yesterday just before we watched ABC run a story about the destruction of Plame's personal and secret life, afterwards my friend remarked: "It's just like Watergate".

It's coming on. Thank gawd a'mighty, Bring It On!

[AndyTiedye]

66. How Far Would Watergate Have Gone with Repub Congress & our Present Media?

I think we all know the answer to that question.

[gordianot]

30. Risk to Palme's African contacts.

I even remember there was a discussion of possible killing of former agents she handled. I have not been able to find a reference to this does anyone have a link?

If she is a covert agent for the CIA handling informers on vrious Governmental nuclear weapon programs that is very risky.

[tinfoilinfor2005]

33. Several past threads spoke of "seventy" deaths related to the outing

of Plame, but I don't remember seeing any references or links.

[Emit]

42. I've read about that here at this link

But it doesn't give much detail.

Here's the one I read
<<snip>>

In what was widely perceived as neat punishment, and a shot over the bow of potential future whistle-blowers, Plame's career was effectively ended. But less noted, Valerie Plame's contacts over a twenty-plus year period were too exposed. Reportedly, more than 90 of them were assassinated as a result of the leak. This more worrisome considering Plame's area of interest was the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, the very area of pressing concern regarding Iraq in 2002/3.
<<snip>>

http://www.pej.org/html/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=2869&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0

[gordianot]

49. Thank you, I suspect we will hear more about this, this is serious.

It is far beyond the level of a "two bit break in" as some liked to describe Watergate. I have seen some post on DU to let this rest in deference to the SCOTUS, but for once there are life and death issues for all of us far beyond the two bit coward in the Whitehouse. The immediate effect is the death of American sons and daughters over a lie "made up intelligence". In the long term we may be sacrificed by actual WMD's that have escaped the intelligence community because an agent of Bush-co "Rove" wanted to gain a political advantage. There have been real crimes committed and there are probably real bodies beyond those killed in Iraq.

[Jackpine Radical]

47. I kinda wish people would stop typing "Palme."

I keep seeing these things and get my chain jerked, wondering if some connectin has been found to the Swedish PM assassinated in 1986. Then I figure it out--another typo.

[gordianot]

50. sorry

[hnsez]

31. BUSH KNEW - we need to just keep hammering on this to swing voters

[HootieMcBoob]

32. All the way to the top

Exactly.

[dooner]

35. Wasn't there a story that Air Force One phone records

from that trip were supoened by Fitzgerald?

The good news is that Fitzgerald seems to be on top of things, even if the media is a little slow, and the Republicans are in denial.

[HootieMcBoob]

36. You are correct sir

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0305-02.htm

WASHINGTON -- The federal grand jury probing the leak of a covert CIA officer's identity has subpoenaed records of Air Force One telephone calls in the week before the officer's name was published in a column in July, according to documents obtained by Newsday.

Also sought in the wide-ranging document requests contained in three grand jury subpoenas to the Executive Office of President George W. Bush are records created in July by the White House Iraq Group, a little-known internal task force established in August 2002 to create a strategy to publicize the threat posed by Saddam Hussein.

And the subpoenas asked for a transcript of a White House spokesman's press briefing in Nigeria, a list of those attending a birthday reception for a former president, and, casting a much wider net than previously reported, records of White House contacts with more than two dozen journalists and news media outlets.

The three subpoenas were issued to the White House on Jan. 22, three weeks after Patrick Fitzgerald, the U.S. attorney in Chicago, was appointed special counsel in the probe and during the first wave of appearances by White House staffers before the grand jury.

[dooner]

41. that's madam! LOL n/t

[Kagemusha]

37. I'm wondering if someone helped himself to Powell's dossier.

That would be serious stuff in and of itself for whoever did it. Or if Powell left the dossier in the open (or someone working for him did). Well pretty much any possibility is serious stuff. Just needs to be nailed down.

[LizW]

40. I don't think so

By that time, they had already used the information in the dossier, or were in the process of using it. Remember, Powell was always the last to know everything. He only got to go in this trip because it was Africa and he was the black guy.

I think Libby and Rove had already decided they were going to hit Wilson and his wife and how they were going to do it. They were just letting Powell in so he would be in the loop and wouldn't screw up the message if someone happened to ask him about Wilson or the Niger uranium claim.

[dansolo]

58. Was Bolton on that trip?

He was under Powell at the time in the State Dept, right?

[LunaC]

38. To just say "Wilson's wife"

You'd be talking about Valerie WILSON. "Plame" was her professional name and that could ONLY have come from classified CIA documents.

[Boo Boo]

60. "Plame" is her maiden name, which can certainly be found without

a security clearance. The crime here (if there is indeed a crime) is that Plame/Wilson was identified as a CIA agent, not that a particular name was revealed. It doesn't matter what her real name is, what matters is that she has been "outed" as working for the CIA. Matching "Wilson" to "Plame" is trivial; knowing that she works for the CIA and not a private company is the key.

Rove can try to claim ignorance and weasel out of the worst penalties, but because he is a WH official working directly for the President, he'll have a much tougher time avoiding a charge of criminal negligence, which is also covered by this law.

[LizW]

39. Do we know that Rove went to Africa with Bush?

I would think he did, but I haven't found anything that specifically says. What about Rice? I thought I remembered that she went too, but the article doesn't mention her.

It is important to remember that all this happened in the context of the "16 words" scandal hitting the fan. The WH was scrambling like crazy to deflect attention from the African uranium claim and how it got into the State of the Union Address. It was finally becoming clear that the Niger documents were forgeries. The big question at the time was, who knew that the Niger claim was false, and when did they know? The noose was tightening.

[flpoljunkie]

43. Isikoff story on Powell's grand jury testimony re Plame, 7/03 Africa trip

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5570006/site/newsweek/

by Michael Isikoff and Eve Conant

Newsweek

Aug. 9 issue - Secretary of State Colin Powell recently testified before a federal grand jury investigating the leak of the identity of CIA covert officer Valerie Plame, NEWSWEEK has learned. Powell's appearance on July 16 is the latest sign the probe being conducted by prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald is highly active and broader than has been publicly known. Sources close to the case say prosecutors were interested in discussions Powell had while with President George W. Bush on a trip to Africa in July 2003, just before Plame's identity was leaked to columnist Robert Novak. A senior State Department official confirmed that, while on the trip, Powell had a department intelligence report on whether Iraq had sought uranium from Niger—a claim Plame's husband, Joseph Wilson, discounted after a trip to Niger on behalf of the CIA. The report stated that Wilson's wife had attended a meeting at the CIA where the decision was made to send Wilson to Niger, but it did not mention her last name or undercover status. At the time, White House officials were seeking to discredit Wilson, who had become a public critic of the Bush administration. There's no indication Powell is a subject of the probe; the department official said the secretary never talked to Novak about the Plame matter. Still, sources say the decision to question Powell shows the thoroughness with which Fitzgerald is conducting the probe—and that knowledge about Plame was circulated at the highest levels of the administration. Though most lawyers thought the investigation was nearly complete, sources say Fitzgerald has recently recalled witnesses before the grand jury—apparently to ask about issues raised by a new Senate intelligence committee report that seemed to contradict some of Wilson's public statements about Plame's role in his trip to Niger.

[warrens]

44. I smell impeachment

Fitzgerald should get the whole pack of jackals on the stand, put em under oath, and grill the bastards. This is treason.

[tandem5]

46. not just impeachy... removal from office nt

[Miss Chybil]

45. They went to Africa to boost standing with black voters? Are you

kidding me? And they went to see the Pope to get a leg up with Catholics. Why didn't they go to Mexico to boost their standing with Puerto Ricans, Brazilians, Chileans, Argentenians, Mexicans, Mexican-Americans, Spanish Speaking Cubans, Guatamalans, Portugese, Spaniards, Bolivians, Costa Ricans... Well, you get my drift. Or, did they go to Mexico, I can't remember.

[flpoljunkie]

52. Video of this Isikoff CNN interview now available at link below...

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2005/07/11.html#a3875

[paineinthearse]

55. This time, hopefully, Newsweek will not retract & cave

Rove's on the ropes, nobody to call the publisher.

[IndianaGreen]

57. It is also possible that some of Bush's friends in the press

spread the Plame leak around, someone like that neocon darling Judith Miller. No one should refer to Miller as a journalist. Her track record at NY Times has been that of a propagandist for an Administration hell-bent on going to war in Iraq.

I am surprised that Colin Powell's name has now come up, rather than that of John Bolton. How far down the rabbit hole did Powell go? Powell has said that had he known that there was faulty evidence on WMD in Iraq that he would have never given his now infamous UN speech. It now appears that not only Powell was a willing accomplice in selling the bullshit WMD story to the public, but that he was also part of a criminal conspiracy to out a CIA agent in order to discredit Ambassador Wilson's report on Iraq procuring yellow-cake uranium in Niger.

[Burried News]

59. Was Rove 'promoted' to assistant chief of staff in preparation

for Fitzgerald's Investigation? - so that they could claim executive priviledge when things got too hot. Previously Rove was an advisor.
If so this would imply that some work product exists that they know will make them vulnerable - work product that they don't control (or didn't until they got Porter Goss into the CIA Directorship).

So far their defense has been so inept it is astounding so it is hard to credit them with any preparation for this day (this happy day :).

[rumpel]

63. Wow this is the big Momma. thanks for the info.

[Carolab]

64. The Italian press and IAEA knew they were forgeries; story was killed.

Rathergate pushed this story off 60 Minutes...

Burba, the Italian journalist, confirmed to Newsweek this week that Martino is the previously mysterious "Mr. X" who contacted her with the potentially explosive documents in early October 2002-just as Congress was debating whether to authorize President Bush to wage war against Iraq. The documents, consisting of telexes, letters and contracts, purported to show that Iraq had negotiated an agreement to purchase 500 tons of "yellowcake uranium from Niger, material that could be used to make a nuclear bomb. (A U.S. intelligence official told Newsweek that Martino is in fact believed to have been the distributor of the documents.)

Burba-under instructions from her editor at Panarama, a newsmagazine owned by Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi-then provided the documents to the U.S. Embassy in Rome in an effort to authenticate them. The embassy soon passed the material on to Washington where some Bush administration officials viewed it as hard evidence to support its case that Saddam Hussein's regime was actively engaged in a program to assemble nuclear weapons.

But the Niger component of the White House case for war quickly imploded. Asked for evidence to support President Bush's contention in his State of the Union speech that Iraq was seeking uranium from Africa, the administration turned over the Niger documents to the International Atomic Energy Agency. Within two hours, using the Google search engine, IAEA officials in Vienna determined the documents to be a crude forgery. At the urging of Sen. Jay Rockefeller, vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, the FBI launched an investigation into the Niger documents in an effort to determine if the United States government had been duped by a deliberate "disinformation" campaign organized by a foreign intelligence agency or others with a political agenda relating to Iraq.


http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/printer_092504I.shtml

[WhiteTara]

65. Wow! and people thought Colon was a patriot

Of course the fact that he helped Lt. Calley cover up Mai Li massacre was the first clue that he would do anything for white man's praise.

[flpoljunkie]

67. Interesting CNN reports Isikoff story only after reported in today's NYT

And, Isikoff has not mentioned it since he dropped it in his appearance on CNN's Inside Politics on Monday, July 11th.

Amazing that story lost to CNN when Isikoff gave them the story six days ago.

Excerpt from NYT story today...the 16th.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/16/politics/16memo.html?ei=5094&en=6d88216f8e1a7671&hp=&ex=1121572800&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print

The memorandum was sent to Colin L. Powell, then the secretary of state, just before or as he traveled with President Bush and other senior officials to Africa starting on July 7, 2003, when the White House was scrambling to defend itself from a blast of criticism a few days earlier from the former diplomat, Joseph C. Wilson IV, current and former government officials said.

Mr. Powell was seen walking around Air Force One during the trip with the memorandum in hand, said a person involved in the case who also requested anonymity because of the prosecutor's admonitions about talking about the investigation.

Investigators are also trying to determine whether the gist of the information in the document, including the name of the C.I.A. officer, Valerie Wilson, Mr. Wilson's wife, had been provided to the White House even earlier, said another person who has been involved in the case. Investigators have been looking at whether the State Department provided the information to the White House before July 6, 2003, when Mr. Wilson publicly criticized the way the administration used intelligence to justify the war in Iraq, the person said.

The prosecutors have shown the memorandum to witnesses at the grand jury investigating how the C.I.A. officer's name was disclosed to journalists, blowing her cover as a covert operative and possibly violating federal law people briefed on the case said. The prosecutors appear to be investigating how widely the document circulated within the administration, and whether it might have been the original source of information for whoever provided the identity of Ms. Wilson to Robert D. Novak, the syndicated columnist who first disclosed it in print.