"It isn't even necessary to see the Phoenix memorandum to question why it wasn't disclosed -- to find out why the FBI doesn't communicate with the CIA," said Senator Arlen Specter.
Attorney General John Ashcroft met for nearly an hour Tuesday with the four lawmakers heading the congressional investigation of the events leading up to Sept. 11 and pledged to cooperate with the inquiry, they said. The Justice Department had balked at turning over some records.
"The information we need, we are going to get," House Intelligence Committee Chairman Porter Goss said after meeting with Ashcroft.
Ashcroft told the lawmakers that the Justice Department has provided 37 witnesses out of the 79 they requested, along with seven more who are preparing to testify. The department has given the committees 9,000 pages of documents and made 20,000 more pages available for inspection in a secure reading room at the FBI headquarters, an official said.
Fleischer said of the congressional inquiry, "The administration is committed to working with Congress to get it done and to do it right."
Top congressional Democrats including Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle on Tuesday repeated calls for an independent commission, saying it would be better suited than Congress for an inquiry.
House Republicans lashed out, calling the commission idea irresponsible, saying it would lead to public release of information that could help terrorists.
The White House may begin routinely releasing intelligence information, domestic security chief Tom Ridge said.
"We have two choices: You can either keep it to yourselves or you can share it," Ridge told the World Economic Forum at the US Chamber of Commerce. "And under the circumstances, depending on the source and the specificity and a few other circumstances and conditions, we may share it."
Ridge said predictions that terrorists may target unnamed apartment buildings, for example, were not enough to change the nation's security alert from "yellow" -- the third-highest of five stages -- and retain the system's credibility.
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