Monday, September 21, 1998
QUESTION: Going down to 6(d) (ph) -- "Has it ever been reported to you that he met with Monica Lewinsky and talked about this case?"
This is your answer, or a portion of it.
"I knew that he met with her. I think we suggested that he meet with her. Anyway, he met with her. I thought that he talked to her about something else."
Why didn't you tell the court when you were under oath, and sworn to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, that she had been talking with Vernon Jordan about the case, about the affidavit from the lawyer, the subpoena?
CLINTON: Well, that's not the question I was asked. I was not asked any question about -- I was asked "Has it ever been reported to you that he met with Monica Lewinsky and talked about this case?"
I believe -- I may be wrong about this -- my impression was that at the time -- I was focused on the meetings. I believe the meetings we had were meetings about her moving to New York and getting a job.
I knew at some point that she had told him that she needed some help because she had gotten a subpoena. I'm not sure I know whether she did that in a meeting or a phone call. And I was not focused on that.
I know Vernon helped her to get a lawyer, Mr. Carter. And I believe that he did it after she had called him, but I'm not sure. But I knew that the main source of their meetings was about her moving to New York and her getting a job.
QUESTION: Are you saying, sir, that you forgot when you were asked this question that Vernon Jordan had come on December 19th, just 3½ weeks before, and said that he'd met that day, the day that Monica got the subpoena?
CLINTON: It's quite -- this is sort of a jumbled answer. It's quite possible that I had gotten mixed up between whether she had met with him or talked to him on the telephone in those 3½ weeks.
Again, I say, sir -- just from the tone of your voice and the way you're asking questions here -- it's obvious that this is the most important thing in the world and that everybody was focused on all the details at the time. But that's not the way it was.
I was doing my best to remember. Now, keep in mind, I don't know if this is true, but the news reports are that Linda Tripp talked to you, then went and talked to the Jones lawyers, and you know, that she prepared them for this.
Now, maybe -- you seem to be criticizing me because they didn't ask better questions, and -- as if you didn't prepare them well enough to sort of set me up or something. I don't know what's going on here.
All I can tell you is I didn't remember all the details of all this. I didn't remember what -- when Vernon talked to me about Monica Lewinsky, where she talked to him on the telephone or had a meeting, I didn't remember all those details.
I was focused on the fact that Monica went to meet with Vernon after Betty helped him set it up and had subsequent meetings to talk about her move to New York.
Now, keep in mind at this time, at this time, until this date here -- when it's obvious that something funny is going here and there's some sort of a "gotcha" game at work in this deposition, until this date, I didn't know that Ms. Lewinsky's deposition wasn't going to be sufficient for her to avoid testifying. I didn't -- you know, so all these details...
QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE). You mean her affidavit?
CLINTON: Excuse me. I'm sorry. Her affidavit -- thank you.
So I don't necessarily remember all the details of all these questions you're asking me because there was a lot of other things going on. And at the time they were going on, until all this came out, this was not the most important thing in my life. This was just another thing in my life.
QUESTION: But Vernon Jordan met with you, sir, and he reported that he had met with Monica Lewinsky. And the discussion was about the lawsuit, and you didn't inform under oath the court of that in your deposition.
CLINTON: I gave the best answer I could based on the best memory I had at the time they asked me the question. That's the only answer I can give you, sir.
QUESTION: And...
CLINTON: And I think I may have been confused in my memory because I've also talked to him on the phone about what he said about whether he talked to her or met with her. That's all I can tell you.
But let me say again, I don't have the same view about this deposition -- I mean, this affidavit that I think you do.
CLINTON: I felt very strongly that Ms. Lewinsky and everybody else that didn't know anything about Paula Jones and anything about sexual harassment, that she and others were themselves being harassed for political purposes in the hope of getting damaging information that the Jones' lawyers could unlawfully leak.
Now, I believed then, I believe today that she could execute an affidavit which, under reasonable circumstances -- with fair-minded, nonpolitically oriented people -- would result in her being relieved of the burden to be put through the kind of testimony that thanks to Linda Tripp's work with you and with the Jones' lawyers she would have been put through.
I don't think that's dishonest. I don't think that's illegal. I think what they were trying to do to her and all these other people who knew nothing about sexual harassment was outrageous -- just so they could hurt me politically.
So I just don't have the same attitude about this you do.
QUESTION: Well, you're not telling our grand jurors that you think the case was a political case for a setup, Mr. President, that that would give you the right to commit perjury...
CLINTON: No, sir. No, sir. In the face of their -- the Jones' lawyers -- the people that were questioning me, in the face of their illegal leaks, their constant unrelenting illegal leaks, in a lawsuit that I knew -- and that by the time that this deposition and this discovery started, they knew -- was a bogus suit on the law and a bogus suit on the facts.
QUESTION: The question...
CLINTON: In the fact of that, I knew that in the face of their illegal activity, I still had to behave lawfully. But I wanted to be legal without being particularly helpful. I thought that was what I was trying to do.
And this is the -- you're the first person to ever suggest to me that I should have been doing their lawyers work for them when they were perfectly free to ask follow-up questions.
On one or two occasions, Mr. Bennett invited them to ask follow-up questions.
It now appears to me they didn't because they were afraid I would give them a truthful answer, and that there had been some communication between you and Ms. Tripp and them. And they were trying to set me up and trick me.
And now you seem to be complaining that they didn't do a good enough job. I did my best, sir, at this time. I did not know what I now know about this.
A lot of other things were going on in my life.
Did I want this to come out? No. Was I embarrassed about it? Yes. Did I ask her to lie about it? No. Did I believe there could be a truthful affidavit? Absolutely.
Now that's all I know to say about this. I will continue to answer your questions as best I can.
QUESTION: You're not going back on your earlier statement that you understood you were sworn to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth to the folks at that deposition, are you, Mr. President?
CLINTON: No, sir, but I think we might as well put this out on the table. You tried to get me to give a broader interpretation to my oath than just my obligation to tell the truth. In other words, you tried to say even though these people were treating you in an illegal manner and illegally leaking these depositions, you should be a good lawyer for them. And if they don't have enough sense to ask a question, and even if Mr. Bennett invited them to ask follow-up questions, if they didn't do it, you should have done all their work for them.
So I will admit this, sir. My goal in this deposition was to be truthful, but not particularly helpful. I did not wish to do the work of the Jones' lawyers. I deplored what they were doing. I deplored the innocent people they were tormenting and traumatizing. I deplored their illegal leaking. I deplored the fact that they knew -- once they knew our evidence, that this was a bogus lawsuit, and that because of the funding they had from my political enemies, they were putting ahead.
I deplored it. But I was determined to walk through the mine field of this deposition without violating the law. And I believe I did.
QUESTION: You're not saying, are you, Mr. President, in terms of doing the work for the Jones' folks, the Jones' lawyers, that you could say as part of your not helping them, I don't know to a particular question when you really knew, and that it was up to them, even if you really knew the answer, it was up to them to do the follow-up -- that you kind of had a one free, I don't know?
CLINTON: No, sir.
QUESTION: If I could finish up. I've been very patient, Mr. President, in letting you finish.
QUESTION: You didn't think you had a free shot to say, "I don't know" or "I don't recall," but when you really did know and you did recall, and it was just up to them, even if you weren't telling the truth, to do a follow-up and to catch you?
CLINTON: No, sir, I'm not saying that. And if I could give you one example. That's why I felt that I had to come back to that question when I said I don't know that and talk about Bruce Lindsey, because I was trying -- I was honestly trying -- to remember how I'd first heard this. I wasn't hung up about talking about this. All I'm saying is the -- it -- let me say something sympathetic to you.
I've been pretty tough, so let me say something sympathetic. All of you are intelligent people. You've worked hard on this. You've worked for a long time. You've gotten all the facts. You've seen a lot of evidence that I haven't seen.
And it's an embarrassing and personally painful thing, the truth about my relationship with Ms. Lewinsky. So the natural assumption is that while all this was going on, I must have been focused on nothing but this, therefore, I must remember everything about it in the sequence and form in which it occurred.
All I can tell you is I was concerned about it. I was glad she saw a lawyer. I was glad she was doing an affidavit.
But there were a lot of other things going on, and I don't necessarily remember it all. And I don't know if I can convince you of that.
But I tried to be honest with you about my mindset about this deposition, and I'm just trying to explain that I don't have the memory that you assume that I should about some of these things.
QUESTION: I want to talk to you for a bit, Mr. President, about the incident that happened at the northwest gate of the White House on December 5th. Sorry, December 6th, 1997. If you'll give me just a moment.
That was a -- let me ask you first, in early 19 -- in early December 1997, the Paula Jones case was pending, correct?
CLINTON: Yes, sir.
QUESTION: You were represented by Mr. Bennett, of course.
CLINTON: Yes, that's correct.
QUESTION: How...
CLINTON: Yes, I do. He was...
QUESTION: How -- I'm sorry. Go ahead.
CLINTON: No, no. Yes, he was representing me.
QUESTION: How often did you talk to him or meet with him, if you can just recall, at that time of the litigation?
CLINTON: Well, we met, I would say -- I wish Mr. Ruff were answering this question instead of me. His memory would be better.
We met probably, oh -- for a long time, we didn't meet all that often, maybe once a month. And then the closer we got to the deposition, we would meet more frequently. So maybe by this time we were meeting more.
We also -- there was a period when we had been approached about...
QUESTION: The question only goes to the number of meetings and not the content of (OFF-MIKE).
CLINTON: I understand. We're not talking about the content. There was a period in which we, I think back in the summer before this, when we had met more frequently. But I would say normally once a month. Sometimes something would be happening; we'd meet more. And then, as we moved toward the deposition, we would begin to meet more.
QUESTION: The witness list came out on December 5th of 1997 with Monica Lewinsky's name on it. Mr. President, when did you find out that Monica's name was on that witness list?
CLINTON: I believe that I found out late in the afternoon on the 6th. That's what I believe.
I've tried to remember with great precision, and because I thought you would ask me about this day, I tried to remember the logical question, which is whether I knew it on the 6th, and if so, at what time. I don't -- I had a meeting in the late afternoon on the 5th -- on the 6th. Excuse me, on the 6th. And I believe that's when I learned about it.
QUESTION: Now, on the morning of the 6th, Monica Lewinsky came to the northwest gate and found out that you were being visited by Eleanor Mondale at the time and had an extremely angry reaction. You know that, sir, don't you?
CLINTON: I have -- I have -- I know that Monica Lewinsky came to the gate on the 6th, and apparently directly called in and wanted to see me and couldn't, and was angry about it.
Continued...
