An outbreak of anthrax contamination neared the presidency on Tuesday, as spores of the bacteria were found in a remote White House mail facility, but US President George W. Bush said he was free of the disease.
"Today, at a remote facility, we detected some anthrax. And just like at the Congress, our government's responding very quickly," Bush told reporters in the White House Cabinet room.
Bush declined to comment on whether he had been tested for the disease, saying simply, "I don't have anthrax."
PHOTO: REUTERS
He voiced confidence in the White House's safety. "I'm confident when I come to work tomorrow that I'll be safe."
News of the White House-related contamination came on a day US officials more openly voiced suspicions the anthrax outbreak was linked to the Sept. 11 attacks on the US, blamed on the al-Qaeda network of Osama bin Laden.
"There is a suspicion that this is connected to international terrorists," White House spokesman Ari Fleischer told reporters earlier in the day. "Our nation is under attack as a result of these mailings."
An administration official said it was unclear whether the contamination in the White House mail facility represented an attack aimed at the presidency, or could have been a secondary contamination originating in machinery at a central Washington processing facility found earlier to have been contaminated.
"That [the possibility of a secondary contamination] is one of the things that's being looked at," the official said.
US Secret Service spokesman Jim Mackin said the amount of anthrax spores found was relatively small, in the range of 20 to 500 spores, well below the 4,000 to 5,000 likely to cause illness.
Fleischer announced the discovery of the contamination at a hastily called press briefing.
The remote processing site was closed after anthrax spores were found on a machine that opens mail, he said. CNN reported that the site was at Washington's Bolling Air Force Base.
Anthrax-laced letters have been sent to the US Congress and to US media companies in New York and Florida over the past several weeks, leading to the deaths of three people, infections in several others and a nationwide scare about biological terrorism.
Bush said there was no hard evidence of involvement by bin Laden in the anthrax outbreak. However, he said, "There's no question that anybody who would mail anthrax with the attempt to harm American citizens is a terrorist. And there's no question that al-Qaeda is a terrorist organization. So ... it wouldn't surprise me that they're involved with this."
"We're having to adjust our thinking," he said. "We're learning [about] people in this world, you know, [who] want to terrorize our country by trying to take life."
Investigators were steadily developing information that leads to a better understanding of the outbreak, Attorney General John Ashcroft said.
Suspicions of a link had not yet significantly entered foreign policy considerations, a US official said.
US House of Representatives Democratic Leader Richard Gephardt said after a meeting between Bush and Congressional leaders that there was a consensus in suspecting a link.
"I think we all suspect that," he said.
Gephardt also described as "weapons grade" the anthrax bacteria used in a letter received last week in the offices of Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, saying the small size of the particles was evidence it had been "milled."
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