PRESIDENT Clinton's former political strategist, Mr Dick Morris, has denied telling a prostitute that Mrs Hillary Rodham Clinton was responsible for a search of FBI files on White House staff.
Mr Morris resigned suddenly from the Clinton re-election campaign when the Star tabloid newspaper revealed that he had been having a year long relationship with the prostitute, Ms Sherry Rowlands, to whom he allegedly confided confidential information.
The Star has now published extracts from Ms Rowland's diary in which she claims that Mr Morris told her that Mrs Clinton ordered the FBI files. "It was Hillary in 1993. She ordered them. She's a paranoid lady. She did it.
The House Government Reform Committee under a Republican congressman, Mr William Clinger, has been investigating the FBI files affair for several months. It has been trying to find out why up to 900 FBI files on former and present White House staff were being examined by Mr Clinton's security staff.
Following the Star diary extracts, Mr Clinger ordered Mr Morris to hand over all documents he might have relating to the FBI files and to respond to Ms Rowland's claim.
Mr Morris in a sworn statement to the committee says that Ms Rowland's claim is "inaccurate". However it is the first time that he has acknowledged meeting Ms Rowlands. Earlier he had said he would not respond in the vitriol of yellow journalism.
In his statement to the committee Mr Morris says that he discussed with Ms Rowlands who the public believed was responsible for the search of FBI files by the White House. My recollection is that I said in words or substance that everyone thinks it's Hillary" who was responsible.
Mr Morris said he based this on a poll that asked people "if they believed the investigations showed the Clintons are responsible for a lot of wrongdoing"? He said that 39 per cent believed that the Clinton's were responsible and of this group, 74 per cent said Mrs Clinton was responsible for the file check and 6 per cent said Mr Clinton was.
Mr Clinger said Mr Morris's statement "doesn't get us any closer to finding out the truth" and that the committee still expects to get more documents from him. "Incredibly, as Mr Morris points out, the White House began polling the issue instead of providing answers to the legitimate questions surrounding this matter," Mr Clinger said.
The White House press secretary, Mr Mike McCurry, said to journalists who asked for his comment. "I didn't know you seek the truth in supermarket tabloids." He said that the efforts of the committee and its chairman were "based more in partisanship than in a desire to seek the truth".
Mr Morris has upset the White House with the news that he has signed a $2.8 million contract with Random House to write a book about the political campaign and his role in it. Mr McCurry said that this was a "violation of the spirit" of the agreement Mr Morris signed in 1995 to list outside sources of income.
Mr Morris did tell the White House that he had an illegitimate child and was fulfilling his obligations.
Mr Morris's wife, Ms Eileen McGann, has said that she has "accepted Dick's apology" over the Ms Rowlands relationship. "We're all human and we all make mistakes."