john dean watergate testimony
john dean watergate testimony
Im learning things that I had never known about what had happened and why it happened.. Items included in the Television News search service. Spectators laughed, and soon the senator was "sputtering mad". The Watergate hearings were produced by the National Public Affairs Center for Television (NPACT), public televisions Washington hub for national news and public affairs programming. Was he hard-nosed and tough? Certain aspects of the scandal came to light before Election Day, but Nixon was reelected by a landslide. [Emphasis added.]. In an exchange with me on March 21, 1973, Nixon conceded such a use of the pardon power was improper: DEAN: Well, thats the problem. [10][pageneeded]. . Eisenberg, MUELLER RPT, VOL. 6; cf. The Watergate "master manipulator" said the former president is in trouble after the latest revelations. The following year, he became an associate deputy in the office of the Attorney General of the United States, serving under Attorney General John N. Mitchell, with whom he was on friendly terms. First, he is a key witness in understanding the Mueller Report. For those of you who lived through Watergate, his name is synonymous with the political intrigue of the 1970s. at 257-258 (discussing relationship between impeachment and criminal prosecution of a sitting President)., Today, you are focusing on Volume II of the report. 1 AND 182.). [17] Neisser did not explain the difference as one of deception; rather, he thought that the evidence supported the theory that memory is not akin to a tape recorder and instead should be thought of as reconstructions of information that are greatly affected by rehearsal, or attempts at replay. Dean's testimony to the senators and at the 1974 trial of the chief conspirators (excepting the President) did not get him totally off the hook. Dean retired from investment banking in 2000 while continuing to work as an author and lecturer, becoming a columnist for FindLaw's Writ online magazine. In a corporation, for example, the attorney would report up to the board of directors or a special committee of the board. For those of you who lived through Watergate, his name is synonymous with the political intrigue of the 1970s. Nixon chose not to disclose the information he did have in order to protect his friend Mitchell, believing that revealing this truth would destroy Mitchell. I learned this fact from Robert Kutak, with whom I had a friendship from our days when we worked as staffers for Congress. (1981). In 2006, Dean testified before the Senate Judiciary Commit . All believed that they could rely on the President to offer clemency under the Presidents pardon power. . (Following Coxs firing, a dozen plus bills calling for Nixons impeachment or creating a special prosecutor were filed in the House. Dean, an executive producer on the CNN project, helped wrangle some of the participants, including Alexander Butterfield, now 96, the deputy chief of staff who dropped the bombshell that Nixon had a taping system in the White House, which ultimately led to the presidents resignation in August 1974. Because, you know, after everybody PRESIDENT: Thats right. DEAN: Thats right. [32], On September 17, 2009, Dean appeared on Countdown with new allegations about Watergate. The coverage includes testimony from James McCord and E. Howard Hunt, two of the men arrested for breaking into the Watergate complex; John Dean, White House counsel from July 1970 to April 1973, who detailed the extent of the Nixon administrations involvement in the burglary and subsequent cover-up; Chief of Staff H.R. I never dreamed I would have to live in this bubble, Dean, 83, said in a Zoom interview from his Beverly Hills home. [3], Dean married Karla Ann Hennings on February 4, 1962; they had one child, John Wesley Dean IV, before divorcing in 1970. II, P. 32); his chief of staff Annie Donaldson made contemporaneous notes of McGahns conversations with the president (e.g., MUELLER RPT, VOL. Weekend Edition revisits audio from Dean's testimony. He has been a go-to talking head whenever a presidential scandal is brewing, and the twice-impeached Donald Trump whose desperate attempt to stay in the White House after losing the 2020 election remains under investigation has kept him busy as a CNN contributor. Former White House counsel John Dean, a key figure in the Watergate scandal that toppled former President Richard Nixon, testifies before a House Judiciary Committee hearing titled, "Lessons from . ART. (Mitchell would not admit this fact, even privately, for almost a year.) And that destroys the case.. NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. The depth of Deans Watergate insights is partly due to a defamation lawsuit he filed against St. Martins Press. In the 1999 film Dick, Dean was played by Jim Breuer. [15] A sharp critic of studying memory in a laboratory setting, Neisser saw "a valuable data trove" in Dean's recall. The mainstream media narrative about Watergate is a grotesque and fantastic distortion of historical fact. 7 min read. This year Dean will be celebrating another anniversary 50 years of marriage to his wife, Maureen. Dean briefly summarizes the takeaways from Comey's testimony and discusses the response by President Trump and his lawyer. They don't know what they're looking at. I havent and maybe Im not creative enough, Dean said. Watergate Lawyer John Dean Predicts Legacy Of Jan. 6 Investigation Into Trump. Shortly after the Watergate hearings, Dean wrote about his experiences in a series of books and toured the United States to lecture. The Mueller Report, like the Watergate Road Map, conveys findings, with supporting evidence, of potential criminal activity based on the work of federal prosecutors, FBI investigators, and witness testimony before a federal grand jury. Well, John Dean has a new book. On April 17, 1973, Nixon told Assistant Attorney General Henry Petersen (who was overseeing the Watergate investigation) that he did not want any member of the White House granted immunity from prosecution. Accordingly, I gave considerable thought to how I would present this situation to the president and try to make as dramatic a presentation as I could to tell him how serious I thought the situation was if the cover-up continue. After John Dean gave his historic 1973 testimony on the Watergate scandal that eventually brought down the Nixon White House, he wanted to move on with his life. But I think he could experience shame. The investigation revealed that Nixon had a tape-recording system in his offices and that he had recorded many conversations. On August 2, 1974, Sirica handed down a sentence to Dean of one to four years in a minimum-security prison. If it was a county sheriff they wouldnt [stay], Dean said. The hearings, recorded by the National Public Affairs Center for Television (NPACT), were broadcast each evening in full, or gavel to gavel, by PBS stations across the nation, so that viewers unable to watch during the day could view the complete proceedings at home. Cognition, 9 (1981)1-22 Elsevier Sequoia S.A., Lausanne - Printed in the Netherlands John Dean's Memory: A case study ULRIC NEISSER" Cornell University Abstract John Dean, the former counsel to President Richard Nixon, testified to the Senate Watergate Investigating Committee about conversations that later turned out to have been tape recorded. [14], When it was revealed that Nixon had secretly recorded all meetings in the Oval Office, famous psychologist and memory researcher Ulric Neisser analyzed Dean's recollections of the meetings, as expressed through his testimony, in comparison to the meetings' actual recordings. He shares his story in the series "Watergate: Blueprint for a Scandal." It . Marshals and kept instead at Fort Holabird (near Baltimore, Maryland) in a special "safe house" primarily used for witnesses against the Mafia. John W. Dean (center) with his wife, Maureen, and John's lawyer, Charles N. Shaffer, in 1974. [17] Dean failed to recall any conversations verbatim, and often failed to recall the gist of conversations correctly. Mr. McGahn is the most prominent fact witness regarding obstruction of justice cited in the Mueller Report. (See U.S. This revised plan eventually led to attempts to eavesdrop on the Democratic National Committee (DNC) headquarters at the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C., and to the Watergate scandal. Yes, Dean and Mo are still married. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information. The coverage includes testimony from James McCord and E. Howard Hunt, two of the men arrested for breaking into the Watergate complex; John Dean, White House counsel from July 1970 to April 1973, who detailed the extent of the Nixon administration's involvement in the burglary and subsequent cover-up; Chief of Staff H.R. Search by keyword or individual, or browse all episodes by clicking Explore the Collection below the search box. When Cox refused this arrangement, Nixon ordered his Attorney General to fire Cox, which Richardson refused to do and resigned himself. In 1973, John Dean was the star witness in the Watergate hearings. The Watergate Hearings Collection covers 51 days of broadcasts of the Senate Watergate hearings from May 17, 1973, to November 15, 1973, and seven sessions of the House impeachment hearings on May 9 and July 24 30, 1974. June 27, 2022 05:36 PM. After Comeys testimony to Congress on May 3, 2017, in which he declined to answer questions about whether the President was personally under investigation, the President decided to terminate Comey. As Nixons secret tape recordings reveal, President Nixon knew the statement was false, and suspected (correctly) that his former attorney general John Mitchell had approved the operation. As Dan mentioned, in the summer of 1973, former White House counsel John Dean testified as part of the Senate's investigation into the Watergate break-in. His guilty plea to a single felony in exchange for becoming a key witness for the prosecution . Dean served as White House Counsel for President Richard Nixon from July 1970 until April 1973. March 21, 1973: Dean tells Nixon there is a "cancer" on the presidency. . In addition, it has long been the rule there is no executive privilege attached to criminal or fraudulent activity. Deans immersion in Watergate since that time has been so deep, he never imagined what his life would have been without it. He is mentioned in the report on 529 occasions, and based on the footnotes he was interviewed at various lengths by the FBI on not less than 9 occasions: July 24, 2015, December 11, 2015 and April 1, 2016 (thus three occasions before Mr. Trump was elected), and July 7, 2017, January 19, 2018, February 16, 2018, March 2, 2018, October 22, 2018, and March 20, 2019 (and on six occasions after Mr. Trump was elected). Paperback. His testimony attracted very high television ratings since he was breaking new ground in the investigation, and media attention grew apace, with more detailed newspaper coverage. DEAN: Im not sure that youll ever be able to deliver clemency. [15], Dean pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice before Watergate trial judge John Sirica on October 19, 1973. The Mueller Report also refers to corroboration of McGahn as a witness in that he made contemporaneous notes on occasions (e.g., MUELLER RPT, VOL. After four months, however, the Watergate trial judge, John J. Sirica, reduced his sentence to time . All rights reserved. Elizabeth Holtzman, a former member of Congress who served on the House Judiciary Committee during the Watergate hearings, said in her interview he was an essential part of the criminal enterprise. Dean himself talks about how he crossed a moral line early in his White House tenure. The program, produced by Herzog & Company, delves into the archive of Watergate-related material Dean has accumulated and stored in his Beverly Hills home over the years, including his 60,000-word testimony to a Senate subcommittee originally written in longhand on yellow legal pads. Dean is known for his role in the cover-up of the Watergate scandal and his subsequent testimony to Congress as a witness. You know, the Watergate hearings just over, Hunt now demanding clemency or hes gonna blow. In many ways the Mueller Report is to President Trump what the so-called Watergate Road Map (officially titled Grand Jury Report and Recommendation Concerning Transmission of Evidence to the House of Representatives) was to President Richard Nixon. [9], In late March in Florida, Mitchell approved a scaled-down plan. John Dean. Journalists Bob Woodward, Carl Bernstein and Lesley Stahl also offer their recollections on the story that helped make their careers. By April 15, Nixon tried to tell me he was kidding about finding $1 million in hush money to pay the burglar defendants to maintain their silence. Records are described at an item level and all records contain brief descriptions and subject terms. CNN Original Series Returns to the Scene of the Crime in "Watergate: Blueprint for a Scandal," Debuting Sunday, June 5. Dean insisted that Cohen be included in the series. They all would have expected to be out and that may put you in a position thats just . Watergate Hearings: John Dean's Opening Statement (1973) John Dean's statement 2011-04-07T03:55:01Z Maureen "Mo" Dean is known for sitting stoically just behind her husband during the . The examples that follow are illustrative rather than exhaustive, and before turning to obstruction of justice, I must make brief mention of the underlying events to place the material in context: MUELLER REPORT VOLUME I: The underlying crimes were a Russian active measures social media campaign and hacking/dumping operations, which Mueller describes as a sweeping and systematic effort to influence our 2016 presidential election. In the summer of 1973, former White House Counsel John Dean testified as part of the Senate's investigation into the Watergate break-in. But the litigation gave Dean access to files from the Watergate special prosecution archives, intensifying his expertise, and he entered the pundit class that emerged when cable news expanded in the mid-1990s. WATERGATE: I am aware of no evidence that Nixon was involved with or had advance knowledge of the Watergate break-in and bugging, or the similar plans for Senator McGovern. You have the problem of clemency for Hunt. John Dean's third day of testimony at the Watergate hearings in 1973. . President Nixon's aide John Dean is sworn in before the Senate committee conducting hearings on the Watergate break-in and the conduct of the Nixon administration, on June 1, 1973. We believe Don McGahn is not in a conflict situation in testifying to this Committee, for his duty is to protect the Office of the Presidency, sometimes against the very person in charge of it. 90- 98): According to Mueller, in addition to McGahn, President Trump pressured former campaign aide Cory Lewandowski and White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus to curtail the Special Counsels investigation through Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who had recused himself from the investigation. Dean went to Camp David and did some work on a report, but since he was one of the cover-up's chief participants, the task put him in the difficult position of relating his own involvement as well as that of others; he correctly concluded that higher-ups were fitting him for the role of scapegoat. Cooper asked Dean, whom the FBI dubbed the "master manipulator" of the Watergate scandal when he flipped to cooperate with prosecutors against Nixon, how high the bar must be for the Justice Department to pursue the charges against Trump. Credit. In this latest book, Dean, who has repeatedly called himself a "Goldwater conservative", built on Worse Than Watergate and Conservatives Without Conscience to argue that the Republican Party has gravely damaged all three branches of the federal government in the service of ideological rigidity and with no attention to the public interest or the general good. Ehrlichman said, John, youll have better job offers after Nixon gets reelected. Yeah, making license plates.. In his testimony, Dean asserted that Nixon covered up Watergate because he believed it was in the interest of national security. [37][38], In September 2018, Dean warned against Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation to the United States Supreme Court,[39][40][41] a main concern being that the appointment would result in "the most presidential-powers-friendly court" in modern times. John Dean Predicts Criminal Case Against Trump After 'Powerful' New Testimony. in 1961. Bob, as a leading legal scholar, was asked to chair an ABA commission to reconsider the ABAs Code of Professional Conduct in light of the Watergate scandal. John Deans statement to the House Judiciary Committee on June 10, 2019, as prepared for delivery. When Colson relayed President Nixons positive response, Hunt pled guilty and the so-called Cuban American defendants followed his lead and pled guilty, as well. a collaboration between the Library of Congress and GBH. Chapter 14 in the book titled "The Lies, The Thefts," divulges the entire memorandum John Ehrlichman, Nixon's Domestic Affairs Advisor, wrote to Treasury Secretary David M. Kennedy and makes for an interesting read. March 23, 1973: The McCord letter is made public by Judge Sirica in open court at McCord's sentencing hearing. His coverage of the television industry has appeared in TV Guide, the New York Daily News, the New York Times, Fortune, the Hollywood Reporter, Inside.com and Adweek. Desperate mountain residents trapped by snow beg for help; We are coming, sheriff says, Newsom, IRS give Californians until October to file tax returns, Californias snowpack is approaching an all-time record, with more on the way, Column: A transgender patients lawsuit against Kaiser is a front for the conservative war on LGBTQ rights, Silent Coup: The Removal of a President,, Nixon hated PBS, but his Watergate scandal gave the fledgling network a major hit, From Chris Rock to the SAG Awards. After hearing of Colodny's work, Liddy issued a revised paperback version of Will supporting Colodny's theory. President Nixons direct interference with the Department of Justice, while facially proper under his Article II constitutional powers, was for the improper purpose of obstructing the investigation. Dean's testimony before the House was watched by some 80 million Americans. The president lauded his efforts. After his plea, he was disbarred. An obstruction of justice conviction prevented the former White House counsel from practicing law in Washington, D.C., and Virginia. WATERGATE: President Trump repeated efforts to have Attorney General Sessions reverse his recusal un-recuse himself to take control of the Special Counsels investigation parallels President Nixons attempt to control the FBI investigation through his former White House Counsel John Ehrlichman. .they should call the FBI and say that we wish for the country, dont go any further into this case, period. In 2001, Dean published The Rehnquist Choice: The Untold Story of the Nixon Appointment that Redefined the Supreme Court, an expos of the White House's selection process for a new Supreme Court justice in 1971, which led to the appointment of William Rehnquist. The White House dissembled on the reason for firing Comey, but President Trump later admitted in a television interview that he made the decision because the thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story. Mr. Trump made similar remarks to visiting Russians in Oval Office. John Dean, while not a fact witness . Dean served as White House Counsel for President Richard Nixon from July 1970 until Ap. Accuracy and availability may vary. John W. Dean, former counsel to President Nixon, reflects on the much-anticipated testimony of former FBI Director James Comey before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday. Mr. JOHN DEAN (Former White House Counsel): What I had hoped to do in this conversation was to have the president tell me we had to end the matter now.