Nixon phone call with Colson on ITT case and Dita Beard

2:12:46Yes, please.
2:12:47Thank you.
2:12:54Yes, sir.
2:12:54Anything new on the typewriter?
2:12:56Well, what I would have to describe, I guess, Mr. President, is something of an impasse.
2:13:02Ah, it's too bad.
2:13:03Yes, it is.
2:13:03It's a damn shame.
2:13:04The independent analysts have gone back, went back after Saturday, and ran all their tests again, and they're flatly convinced that the thing was typed on Monday, in January.
2:13:18Right.
2:13:19On Monday, today, we got the FBI report, and they say they can't be absolutely convinced when it was typed, but it isn't like the ink used after June, which means that, in effect, they're saying that it was typed before June.
2:13:37The independent people, which includes one good criminal laboratory, says that the FBI system isn't any good, and the FBI says that theirs is the best in the world.
2:13:46And by reputation theirs is obviously... Yeah, I understand.
2:13:50It's tough to...
2:13:50It's very, very hard to be a mess.
2:13:52So this is something you can't use, then?
2:13:54Well, the ITT people want to use it.
2:13:57They claim they... Well, they haven't settled that question completely.
2:14:01They have to go back and do some more checking tonight, and they're going to make that decision tomorrow.
2:14:08We've warned them.
2:14:09We've told them that we may very well pull the rug on them, and...
2:14:14They contend they're right, and they're pretty damned adamant about it at this point.
2:14:17They also were further confirmed in their judgment by the affidavit which they got from the Secretary of Canada, which apparently came through superbly.
2:14:27She stated that she is, by her own definition, a left-wing Democrat, and had anything of that kind been in that memo, she would have...
2:14:39We had another fascinating development, and that is that they found another document of the same date, written by Dita Beard, which they discovered in New York, in which Dita Beard said, as she was writing this as a progress report on her handling of her job in Washington, she said,
2:14:58exclusively responsible for getting the republican convention to our site in san diego and if we are successful in getting the convention there it will be worth millions to us in publicity which is a document that was turned up in new york on saturday afternoon and by itnt by itnt and is very inconsistent with the purported memorandum i mean she isn't writing that one day in the senate and and
2:15:27some hours later or earlier, saying that there's confusion over who's handling it, and the contribution is to settle our antitrust case.
2:15:37So it's a...
2:15:40I'm in something of a quandary.
2:15:42IT&T is going to put out her affidavit publicly.
2:15:47They were supposed to have gotten it out by now, and I've been watching the wires and haven't seen it, so they may put it over tomorrow.
2:15:53They also are going to put out her other memo of June 25th to show the obvious inconsistency.
2:15:58Meanwhile, Scott is running a speech on the wires that is running very hard in which he says he will boycott any further hearings until Senate Republican Leader Hugh Scott is boycotting the Senate Judiciary Committee's investigation of the ITT matter until the subcommittee...
2:16:16Concludes its interviews with Dieter Beard.
2:16:19Are they going out or not?
2:16:21Well, they're trying to settle that.
2:16:23The Democrats don't want to.
2:16:24The Republicans want them to.
2:16:26What the hell do the Democrats want to do?
2:16:29Just ignore it?
2:16:30No, they want to parade through other witnesses first.
2:16:33They want to get in Janine.
2:16:35They want to get in Bob Wilson.
2:16:36They want to get in Reinecke.
2:16:38And they are stalling for time.
2:16:41Now, we do know that Kennedy and Tunney...
2:16:44knew that something was coming in life.
2:16:45We don't know that they knew the particular story that came in life.
2:16:49And I think they're just using this platform, Mr. President, to continue the attacks on the administration.
2:16:57Sure.
2:16:57And this is the focal point of it.
2:17:01In his statement today, he charged that the Democrats were engaged in a deliberate stall, and he was going to force the... Well, the life story is pretty far removed from this, except that it looks like it isn't.
2:17:13Well, sure, it's just more of the same kind of innuendo, and it involves Kleindienst directly, because apparently he made...
2:17:20I don't have all the facts on it yet, I've been waiting for him from Justice, but he apparently made the decision with respect to the
2:17:29the investigation of the U.S. attorney out there, and proclaimed him to be cleared, which is the only charge in there that... Yeah, well, life...
2:17:39It's very hard.
2:17:39Let me say life is engaging, and it's last gasp Saturday evening post-tactic.
2:17:46Well, sure they are, and I'm certain that they hurried this in order to get it in while these hearings remained open, and maybe that's one of the reasons behind this story.
2:17:54The story is about three years old, and it's in here and there.
2:17:57Anyway...
2:17:58Well, it's not one that's going to have much... Well, I shouldn't say that.
2:18:02I don't think it's going to have the impact, because I don't think that reading the damn press reports, the average person is going to understand what the hell they're talking about.
2:18:14All it does is put some more coals into the fire.
2:18:17Going back to the typewriter, the quandary that we're in is that all the other evidence...
2:18:28in terms of the testimony of the people at least, supports the fact that this was not her memorandum.
2:18:35Yeah, I see.
2:18:36You know, the people, everybody in the office, the secretaries, and we have a... And she says so.
2:18:44And she says so, and we just have a very, very clear conflict among the experts, and the more people you talk to in this business, and the more people you get into it, the more unreliable all their goddamn tests appear.
2:18:55Yeah, I know, I know.
2:18:57So it's just a damn shame that we... Too bad this can't... Well, anyway, I don't know.
2:19:06The bureaus, sometimes, you know, they weren't too damn helpful in his case.
2:19:10I had to do it from the outside.
2:19:12Well, that's precisely what Mrs. Tytill is saying.
2:19:14She is saying, I don't trust the bureau examination, and I can poke all kinds of holes in it.
2:19:22and she could never do it and she could never win in a public country that's the problem that's the problem the minute the minute that if the bureau is going to say that well they're not of course they've written a report to justice which justice has agreed to give to offered to give to the committee so we we know that there will be
2:19:40The Bureau's report is couched in some gobbledygook, and you can argue that they're really not pinning it down.
2:19:48On the other hand, this game is being played in the press.
2:19:53The interesting thing over the weekend is, I'm sure you know it by reading the news summary, and I've read everything I could find this weekend, that all the press and the people on the Hill are playing this as the turning point.
2:20:07They're saying that
2:20:08that if Dita Beard's statement is sustained, in other words, if her position is sustained, that, well, Newsweek put it best, that the tables will have been turned on the Senate liberals and that this will boomerang on them.
2:20:21I know.
2:20:22Well, that's why... Too bad you haven't got some hard evidence.
2:20:26Let them find it out, okay?
2:20:28Well, the only thing we can do is just... All right.
2:20:31We'll just keep slugging back at it, Mr. President.
2:20:34One way you might get a break in some other area.
2:20:36Well, this fellow over at the Justice Department, you know, thinks that it's...
2:20:40He's convinced the D is not an authentic D that she initialed the memo with, and he brought over two or three samples today and looked at them, showed them to us, and they really...
2:20:50There is a question about them, so we'll...
2:20:53We'll find it.
2:20:54We're not doing so badly right now.
2:20:55I think we've got them all very nervous.
2:20:58When does their hearing start?
2:21:00No, sir.
2:21:01The last time I checked, which was an hour ago, they had not been able to determine when they would start.
2:21:06And Scott...
2:21:08says that he and the other Republicans will not attend any further hearings here until they go to Denver.
2:21:12They can't get an agreement.
2:21:13They ought to keep right to that line.
2:21:15No more hearings until they go to Denver.
2:21:16Oh, they're going to hang tough as hell on that one.
2:21:19And then let them go out on their own.
2:21:21Good.
2:21:21Exactly.
2:21:23Well, okay.
2:21:24We'll stay with it, Mr. President.
2:21:25Thank you, sir.
2:21:28Please.
2:21:29Secretary Connolly, please.
2:21:30Thank you.
2:21:36Mr. President, you called the Secretary Connolly.
2:21:38He isn't in the office.
2:21:39The Secretary seems to think he's still over here.
2:21:43Can she try to locate him and call you?
2:21:47Why don't you check it for her and tell her that's all right for her.
2:21:50She can forget it.
2:21:50And I'll check and see if I can find him.
2:21:53Yes, I will.
2:21:53Yes, sir.

Nixon phone call with Colson on ITT case and Dita Beard

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Also recorded on March 19, 1972

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