Tomorrow will see the latest battle in the the Bush administration's war with the House of Representatives over congressional testimony from top White House aides.
Karl Rove, facing a subpoena to appear before a House Judiciary subcommittee, declared through his attorney last week that he refused to appear "on the grounds that Executive Privilege confers upon him immunity from process in response to a subpoena directed to this subject."
Judiciary Committee chairman John Conyers (D-MI) responded by warning that the committee could move to hold Rove in contempt of Congress if he fails to show.
But now, liberal blogs are buzzing with an unsourced report that Speaker Nancy Pelosi is blocking Conyers from following through with the contempt charge. The rumor has spread far and wide on left-leaning blogs and message boards, from Democratic Underground to TPM Cafe.
And apparently it's false. Pelosi's communications director Brendan Daly sent us the following statement:
Those reports are completely untrue -- the Speaker has not urged the Judiciary Committee not to seek contempt charges against Karl Rove.
The committee can seek a contempt citation if it decides to do so. (Fyi, Henry Waxman's Oversight Committee is looking at a contempt citation against the attorney general over documents. The Speaker has no objections to that -- it's the committee's decision.)
A source with the House Judiciary Committee also denied Pelosi was opposing contempt charges.