WASHINGTON -- Director Robert Mueller of the FBI has issued a stern message to the bureau's nearly 30,000 employees warning them against leaks of confidential information, after recent news articles disclosed criminal inquiries involving incumbent lawmakers, mainly House Republicans.
"There have been a number of recent stories in the press attributing sensitive law enforcement information to 'federal law enforcement officials,' " Mueller wrote in an Oct. 26 e-mail message. "While I cannot say they have come from FBI employees, such disclosures do serious damage to our investigations and risk unfairly tarnishing the subjects of our investigations, who enjoy the presumption of innocence."
Aides said Mueller, a former U.S. attorney and longtime courtroom prosecutor known for his strict adherence to secrecy rules, wrote the e-mail message to communicate his strong views on the topic, although FBI officials deny that agents were sources for the articles.
Other administration officials said Mueller had initially contemplated sending an even sharper message after getting complaints from Justice Department officials about the unauthorized disclosures. They said the grousing seemed to intensify as it appeared that control of the House could be decided by a handful of bruising contests in which accusations of ethical impropriety have become pivotal.
The sequence of events that irked Mueller began on Oct. 1 with the FBI's confirmation that the bureau had opened a preliminary inquiry into sexually explicit computer messages sent by Mark Foley, the Republican former representative from Florida, to underage congressional pages.
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Some of the disclosures have thrown the FBI off balance, as did an Oct. 14 report by McClatchy Newspapers that said federal agents had opened a criminal inquiry into whether Rep. Curt Weldon, R-Pa., had obtained jobs and other favors for his daughter in exchange for helping overseas firms expand their business in the United States. Investigators were forced to conduct the searches much sooner than they had planned, fearing evidence might be destroyed after publication of the news articles, officials said.
Not all of the leaks involving incumbent lawmakers have been about Republicans. On Oct. 20, Time magazine reported on its Web site that Rep. Jane Harman, D-Calif., had been the subject of an investigation, which is no longer active, into her dealings with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, a pro-Israel lobbying group.
The latest leak came on Oct. 24, when news organizations reported that Rep. Rick Renzi, R-Ariz., was under investigation by the U.S. attorney's office in Phoenix over land deals.
