US Justice monitoring whether workers had political motive for looking at Obama ' s passport
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1) The U.S. State Department says officials at the Justice Department are monitoring the State Department's internal investigation into whether three contract workers had a political motive for looking at Democratic president candidate Barack Obama's passport file.
2) State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Friday that the State inspector general's office is looking into the matter, but Justice Department officials have been notified in case they need to get involved.
3) Meantime, McCormack said that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice plans "soon" to reach out to Obama about the incidents.
4) Two of the contract employees were fired for the security breach and the third was disciplined but is still working, the department said Thursday night.
5) Passport files contain personal data such as name, citizenship, age, Social Security number and place of birth.


Rice apologizes to Obama for passport breach
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1) U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Friday apologized to Sen. Barack Obama for a security breach in which three State Department contractors inappropriately reviewed the Democratic presidential candidate's passport file.
2) The episode raised questions as to whether the actions of the three contractors, two of whom have been fired, were politically motivated. Obama and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton are in a close race for the Democratic presidential nomination.
3) "I told him that I was sorry, and I told him that I myself would be very disturbed," Rice told reporters.
4) "None of us wants to have a circumstance where any American's passport files are looked at in an unauthorized way," she said.
5) Rice, who spoke with Obama by phone, said she was particularly disappointed that senior officials at the State Department were not immediately notified.
6) "It was not to my knowledge, and we also want to take every step to make sure that this kind of thing doesn't happen again," she said.
7) The State Department's inspector general is investigating the passport breach, which occurred on three separate occasions -- Jan. 9, Feb. 21 and as recently as last week, on March 14. On Friday, the department announced that the Justice Department would be monitoring the probe in case it needs to get involved.
8) State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Friday that the State Department would make results of the investigation available to congressional oversight committees and to Obama's office.
9) Bill Burton, a spokesman for Obama's presidential campaign, has called the incident "an outrageous breach of security and privacy."
10) Two of the employees were fired for the security breach and the third was disciplined but is still working, the department said Thursday. It would not release the names of those who were fired and disciplined or the names of the two companies for which they worked.
11) It is not clear whether the employees saw anything other than the basic personal data such as name, citizenship, age, Social Security number and place of birth, which is required when a person fills out a passport application.
12) Aside from the file, the information could allow Obama's critics to dig deeper into his private life. While the file includes his date and place of birth, address at time of application and the countries he's traveled to, the most important detail would be his Social Security number, which can be used to pull credit reports and other personal information.
13) "This is a serious matter that merits a complete investigation, and we demand to know who looked at Senator Obama's passport file, for what purpose and why it took so long for them to reveal this security breach," Burton said on Thursday.
14) McCormack said the breaches were detected by internal State Department computer checks. The department's top management officer, Undersecretary Patrick Kennedy, said certain records, including those of high-profile people, are "flagged" with a computer tag that tips off supervisors when someone tries to view the records without a proper reason.
15) The firings and unspecified discipline of the third employee already had occurred when senior State Department officials learned of the breaches. Kennedy called that a failing.
16) "I will fully acknowledge this information should have been passed up the line," Kennedy told reporters in a conference call Thursday night. "It was dealt with at the office level."
17) In answer to a question, Kennedy said the department doesn't look into political affiliation in doing background checks on passport workers. "Now that this has arisen, this becomes a germane question, and that will be something for the appropriate investigation to look into," he said.
18) The department informed Obama's Senate office of the breach on Thursday. Kennedy said that at the office's request, he will provide a personal briefing for the senator's staff on Friday. No one from the State Department spoke to Obama personally on Thursday, the officials said.
19) Obama was born in Hawaii and lived in Indonesia for several years as a child before returning to the United States. As a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, he has traveled to the Middle East; the former Soviet states with Republican Sen. Richard Lugar; and Africa, where in 2006 he and his wife, Michelle, publicly took HIV tests in Kenya to encourage people there to do the same.
20) Obama's father was born in Kenya, and the senator still has relatives there.
21) The disclosure of inappropriate passport inquiries recalled an incident in 1992, when a Republican political appointee at the State Department was demoted over a search of presidential candidate Bill Clinton's passport records. At the time he was challenging President George H.W. Bush.
22) The State Department's inspector general said the official had helped arrange the search in an attempt to find politically damaging information about Clinton, who had been rumored to have considered renouncing his citizenship to avoid the Vietnam War draft.
23) The State Department said the official, Steven Berry, had shown "serious lapses in judgment."
24) After a three-year, $2.2 million (euro1.4 million) probe, a federal independent counsel exonerated officials in the incident, saying that while some of the actions investigated were "stupid, dumb and partisan," they were not criminal. The independent counsel also said that Berry and others who were disciplined for their involvement were treated unfairly.
25) Doug Hattaway, a spokesman for Hillary Clinton, said of the current breach: "It's outrageous and the Bush administration has to get to the bottom of it."
26) Kennedy and McCormack said it was too soon to say whether a crime was committed. The searches may violate the federal Privacy Act, and Kennedy said he is consulting State Department lawyers.
27) The State Department inspector general's power is limited because two of the employees are no longer working for the department. McCormack said it was premature to consider whether the FBI or Justice Department should be involved.
28) McCormack said Rice was informed of the breaches on Thursday.
29) The Washington Times first reported on the breaches.


Passport files for Clinton, Obama, McCain were pried into by State Department workers
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1) State Department workers pried into the supposedly secure passport files of presidential contenders Hillary Rodham Clinton, Barack Obama and John McCain, abashed officials admitted Friday in a revelation that had Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice telephoning the candidates personally to apologize.
2) The snooping incidents raised questions as to a political motivation and why two contractors involved were fired before investigators had a chance to interview them. The State Department's inspector general was probing, with the Justice Department monitoring the effort, but Obama said that was not enough. He urged the involvement of Congress "so it's not simply an internal matter."
3) The digging into supposedly secure government records on politicians recalled a 1992 case in which a Republican political appointee at the State Department was demoted for searching Democrat Bill Clinton's passport records when Clinton was running against President George H.W. Bush.
4) McCain, the Republican nominee-in-waiting, said there should be a full investigation of the new snooping as well as an apology.
5) Democrat Obama said it should include Congress, not just Bush administration investigators.
6) "When you have not just one but a series of attempts to tap into people's personal records, that's a problem not just for me but for how our government functions," Obama told reporters in Portland, Oregon, where he was campaigning. "I expect a full and thorough investigation. It should be done be in conjunction with those congressional committees that have oversight function so it's not simply an internal matter."
7) Rice was apologetic in public as well as in her private phone calls to the candidates.
8) "None of us wants to have a circumstance in which any American's passport file is looked at in an unauthorized way," she said after speaking with Obama.
9) "I told him that I was sorry, and I told him that I, myself, would be very disturbed if I learned that somebody had looked into my passport file," she added. "And therefore, I will stay on top of it and get to the bottom of it."
10) The State Department confirmed Thursday night that Obama's files had been compromised on three occasions: Jan. 9, Feb. 21 and as recently as last week, March 14. By the time senior officials were made aware, two contract employees had been fired and a third disciplined, agency officials said. The fact that the two have been fired could make it more difficult for the State Department to force them to answer questions.
11) The department would not name the company that employed those workers, but The Associated Press learned it was Stanley Inc., a company based in Virginia's Washington suburbs that won this week a five-year, $570-million (euro369.6-million) government contract to support passport services.
12) Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Friday that a separate search conducted after the first revelation showed that workers also had snooped on McCain and Clinton.
13) The individual who had been reprimanded in the Obama incident had also reviewed McCain's records early this year, McCormack said. While the employee has not been fired, that person no longer has access to passport files, he said.
14) "I can assure you that person's going to be at the top of the list of the inspector general when they talk to people, and we are currently reviewing our (disciplinary) options with respect to that person," McCormack said.
15) In Clinton's case, someone accessed her file last summer as part of a training session involving another State Department worker. McCormack said the violation was immediately recognized and the person was admonished.
16) The department's internal computer system "flags" certain records, including those of high-profile people, to tip off supervisors when someone tries to view the records without an appropriate reason.
17) McCormack said information on the incidents points to workers' "imprudent curiosity" more than to something more sinister.
18) Still, he said, "we are not dismissive of any other possibility, and that's the reason why we have an investigation under way," he said.
19) Likewise, Patrick Kennedy, the top management official at the State Department, briefed the candidates' staffs on Capitol Hill, then said to reporters, "The State Department has very, very rigorous rules about controls and access for privacy material. We review them regularly and we have a large organization with a lot of people in it. Mistakes and errors happen from time to time. ... We caught these and we've got to work and correct that process."
20) Attorney General Michael Mukasey said the case has not yet been referred to the Justice Department for investigation and indicated prosecutors were likely to wait until the State Department's inspector general ends that inquiry. But Mukasey did not rule out the possibility of the Justice Department taking an independent look.
21) "Have they asked us to become involved -- no," Mukasey said. "When, as, and if we have a basis for an investigation, including a reference -- that is, one basis would be a reference -- we could conduct one."
22) Asked what another basis could be, Mukasey said: "I don't want to speculate, but if somebody walked in here with a box full of evidence, they wouldn't be turned away."
23) The Washington Times first reported the incident involving Obama.