Bush, Senate leader at odds over Ridge testimony

Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., said Tuesday he had rejected a White House offer for Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge to brief lawmakers privately, saying Ridge has a "responsibility" to testify before Congress about his budget and operations.

Daschle said the Bush administration proposed that Ridge meet with senators in S-407, a secure room in the Capitol, to "talk about his budget and agenda in secret."

Monday, the White House flatly rejected congressional demands that Ridge come to Capitol Hill to testify.

White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer pointed to the tradition that the president's White House advisers do not have to testify before Congress, in contrast to Cabinet officials.

"This is an important line to draw, and the president has drawn it," Fleischer said. "There is a longstanding bipartisan tradition that Congress should not violate." Fleischer noted that the practice had been upheld "in times of war and in times of peace."

Suggesting the matter would not be resolved before Congress adjourns at the end of the week for its two-week spring recess, Daschle said it was too early to tell whether Democrats would seek to compel Ridge to testify with a subpoena.

He said Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., had discussed the issue "at length" at the Democrats' regular Tuesday policy luncheon and indicated that a decision to issue a subpoena would come from the committees of jurisdiction.

GOP sources said Ridge and other administration officials were seeking ways for him to meet with lawmakers without formally testifying before the Appropriations Committee, which they believe would open the door to other committees demanding such testimony.

Ridge met with Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., Tuesday evening to discuss the matter.

Ridge has given lawmakers "all the information they're seeking" in private meetings, Fleischer said Monday. "The information will continue to be forthcoming," he added.

Fleischer said the White House was "surprised" by the subpoena threat and criticized the "elevated" rhetoric surrounding the issue.

But he declined to ascribe political motives to Daschle, suggesting instead that the tug of war over Ridge was part of the "age-old balance-of-power issue" between the executive and legislative branches of government.