GOP Senator demands FBI brief Congress on its probe of 2001 anthrax attacks before Thanksgiving

RAW STORY
Published: Tuesday October 24, 2006

Iowa Republican Senator Chuck Grassley is demanding that the FBI brief Congress on its investigation into the 2001 anthrax attacks before Thanksgiving, according to Roll Call.

"In a pointed, five-page letter to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, dated today, Grassley attacked the FBI’s 'blanket prohibition' on briefing Capitol Hill about the attacks, which included two letters directed at sitting Senators and left five people dead and more than a dozen injured. Roll Call reported the three-year-old ban on anthrax briefings Oct. 12, with the bureau saying it was necessitated by Congressional leaks," reports Roll Call.

Excerpts from Roll Call article:

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"If some individual did act inappropriately by speaking to the media about an FBI briefing, stiff-arming Congress on all future requests is an unacceptable over-reaction. The FBI doesn’t become exempt from scrutiny just because there may have been an inappropriate disclosure by someone on Capitol Hill," wrote Grassley, a senior member of the Judiciary Committee and FBI critic for more than two decades.

Grassley raised the specter that the lack of briefings may instead have been prompted by an investigation that "has little in the way of results to show for its work."

He asked Gonzales to force an FBI briefing by Nov. 21, the anniversary of the last death traced to the anthrax letters.

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FULL ROLL CALL ARTICLE CAN BE READ AT THIS LINK