On May 20, 1973, President Richard M. Nixon and Ronald L. Ziegler talked on the telephone from 10:17 pm to 10:43 pm. The White House Telephone taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 046-120 of the White House Tapes.
Transcript (AI-Generated)This transcript was generated automatically by AI and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Do not cite this transcript as authoritative. Consult the Finding Aid above for verified information.
Hello.
I have Mr. Ziegler now, sir.
Hello.
There you are.
Hi, Ron.
Yes, sir.
Did you get home?
Just got here, yes, sir.
Had a long day, huh?
Well, we had a good day, though.
How's it looking?
Is it getting in shape?
I think so.
And the guys are working on it tonight.
Everyone's enthused about it.
And they think it's a good idea.
Right.
And Bryce is coming in in the morning.
We had a long talk with him by phone tonight.
going to be in the 7.30 in the morning.
We'll look it over so we'll have, you know, another cut at it at 9.
Oh, I wonder, would you like for me to take a look at 9?
We're shooting for your 9 o'clock point to at least look at, you know, the...
I can start at least to take a look.
Oh, absolutely.
I think it's essential you...
So that I get the feel and so forth and so on.
Right.
How long is it approximately at the present?
What are you sort of gaming at?
Oh, it's about 20 pages.
That's all right.
It's a statement, you know.
That's right, sir B.
What do you try to do?
Just give me a quick rundown.
Well, we make the point about the climate in 1969 and 70, why— The national security.
That's right, why certain steps were taken.
And you cover everything from the FBI to the plumbers to— The plumbers, why that was put into effect.
I want to be sure that's stated very strongly because it's very important.
and Krogh, you know, that we put a national security screen over that damn thing.
Do you see what I mean?
Right.
Which it deserves.
We move through it in that way.
Then into, you know, the Watergate thing, why that happened, how it happened, and so forth.
Do you discuss Watergate?
Yes, sir.
That's all right.
But putting it all in perspective, they're working on it tonight and it'll be ready in the morning.
Lynn has a hell of a good idea, Lynn Carmen.
Incidentally, too.
She really turned into a fighter on this thing.
Lynn is brilliant and knows how to fight.
She's a great trailer.
And I hope we just
We just ought to knock that goddamned CIA thing right out of the box.
That burns my ass because that was a perfectly normal thing and Luke Haldeman and Ehrlichman are just furious about it because they're ready to—they want the privilege removed so that they can testify on it.
Well, all of that's calculated into the— Right.
And they want to have an opportunity to appear before the Jackson Committee in order to do it.
Well, that's helpful, too, if they want to do that.
But that's, you know, we're structuring the thing along the line to put that in perspective.
But Lynn's idea is this, as far as the paper, is that if the, you know, without being strident in our opposition to the Irvin Committee, that we set up a team at the White House as we move through this thing.
And as the hearings break each day,
Not only does Ziegler go out, but maybe Garment goes out, or with me, or with someone else.
And we begin to, when McCord makes a statement, we call him on it.
We say, okay, now we suggest that we just saw, or on the wire.
For example, on McCord, could I suggest something?
And I mentioned this, because people are used to being cross-examiners.
Did anybody think to ask him what he did before he came here?
Well, that's the point, you see.
Nobody asked.
This son of a bitch was a bugger.
He has got a hell of a record, you know.
Right, see.
And said, were you ever convicted of anything?
Did you ever engage in this sort of activity before?
That's right.
Who hired you?
That's right.
What do you think, you know?
That's right.
But if they're not going to do that, see, what we would do in the briefings is call their hand.
And demand that they say that they do.
Here are some questions that we would like for the...
The thing to do, you see, is to—is to do what Ol' Walsh did to McCarthy, just to kill the committee.
That's a process.
And, uh— And Len's working on that tonight.
You see, Len—Len's a real tiger, is he?
Oh, boy, I tell you, he's really—he's—he's
I don't know, quite frankly, what Bob and John had against him, but this guy is a fine guy.
He's one of the hardest— Well, Bob and John were against him for reasons that Len
I and everybody agreed that Bob and John had to go.
I mean, and they didn't agree.
But Len, on the other hand, is a totally loyal presidential man.
Absolutely.
That's the thing they don't realize.
It really is.
Don't you agree?
Totally.
And he's working tonight.
He's calling some guy who's an expert on the—
rules of evidence and, you know, elements of cross-examination.
And we're going to set up a team.
This is one thing we're going to talk to them on.
This is part of the statement.
How we get off of the defensive in the briefings after the statement is made.
And then we go up to the Ziegler just out there every day.
Right.
And they offend him.
We can't comment.
We can't comment on it.
Right.
Right.
My God, we walk out there.
And we say, look.
These charges were made.
They're fourth-hand here today.
And incidentally, I do it, and I do it right at the White House and say, now this is a battle, and they're doing this and that.
But the main thing, too, is that if we could get Timmons, a little stronger fellow there, he's strong.
But maybe Bryce could get a few people at Bryce's.
You know, it's very influential.
What does he think?
He has some great ideas about how we move on the stage and, you know, how we move privately.
And tell some of the
congressmen and senators who step up there and say, my God, fellows, this has gotten out of hand.
It's going to disgrace the Senate and ruin the country and so forth and so on.
And, you know, we can do that after we bridge off of the statement once we get it in line.
It's, of course, a complex thing, which we're today on.
I know.
Terribly complex.
And the guys are really
really coming through.
They really are.
We've got a good team and everyone's in sync.
I'm glad to hear that.
I nailed down, I got a hold of Bob because I thought it was the best one.
Erlich was on the west coast.
I said, now look here, I just want to be sure on a few points.
I said, with regard to whether or not there was ever any discussion of clemency with Erlich, tell me what
it was.
And Ehrlichman said there was never any discussion as Dean described.
He said, one day on the beach in July, before anybody ever thought of this, we were walking along and he just casually said,
looking down the road, some of these fellows are going to want clemency.
And he said that, and he recorded it afterwards.
He said that I said, absolutely not, because doing that would be condoning what they did.
Right.
And he wants to testify to that.
Sure.
And let's let him do it.
I agree.
I mean, let's see.
What we want to do is to release executive testimony privilege whenever it helps us and not release us when it doesn't help us.
That's right.
And I also checked a few other little things, like, oh, we got, you know, like this old, very, it's a little, it is a really tricky one, but, you know, this business about, which is the toughest for John and for all of us, for John didn't know about that damn break-in, you know.
But also, Peterson knew about it in the fall of this year.
And I didn't learn about it until the spring.
And they told me, you see.
And then at that point, I started my investigation.
And as soon as it was nailed down, we informed the judge, which ain't bad.
We didn't do it soon enough, but we did do it.
We did try to cover it up.
And I think that's not a bad story.
No, that's fine for Erlichman to testify.
We don't have to get bogged down in those kind of details.
That's good for Erlichman to be able to say.
Well, see, I don't want them, Ron, to be in a position to say that the president had knowledge that there were these
buggers were really cotsy, which I had no knowledge of until March, that there was a picture in the file indicating that they may have been the people that broke in.
But God damn it, I didn't know a shit.
I couldn't believe Dean on anything.
And I knew the Justice Department had it.
And I'm going to play that very tough.
I think the whole thing right now is to play everything very tough.
everybody else is lying.
Don't you think so?
They're all dealing—see, the only thing we should do, quite frankly, Mr. President, in all of this, is speak very candidly and very directly about the President's knowledge and motivations.
And we cannot get, in all fairness to the men involved—and this is going to be—it's going to help them—we cannot get into a position where we are defending
You know, the good guys, Bob, Dean, or anyone else.
But not because we want to cut them apart, but because the only way that they can operate really now is with a free hand.
That's right.
As a matter of fact, the curious thing about this whole miserable business is that I actually knew absolutely nothing about the goddamn thing, because I even checked with...
Ehrlichman through Haldeman as to whether I knew whether Ehrlichman had told Kambach that he could raise money.
And Ehrlichman said, absolutely not.
And that Kambach says absolutely not.
Kambach says he assumed that maybe I did, but he had heard nothing from me.
Mr. President, I'll tell you, there's no one who can testify to that more than I can because
I know in our discussions and when the press questions came up and so forth,
Number one, you would not have allowed me to make comments that I made if you did have that awareness.
You know, I just know that.
Well, good God, I wouldn't do it because I'm not that stupid.
That's what I mean.
Forget my morality.
No, but that's the point.
And you take the whole business of the damn CIA thing.
I'm going to murder them on that if they raise that.
I said, good God, of course we investigated the damn CIA.
It was ended up right to their ass.
And I don't know what they were doing.
you know?
Right.
And that various people say this or that or the other thing, but absolutely nobody ever offered anything, you know, and so forth and so on.
Right.
See, the strength of the whole thing as we talk tonight and as we're preparing the statement is based totally on your awareness, your motivations, and also—
what other people could have interpreted from what you said based on your awareness versus theirs.
Oh, one other thing that John told me, interesting thing, he said, John, I said, did I ever discuss amnesty with you?
He said, well, first, this fucking bull story that he came into the room and got the word and went out and said, you can go offer it, but not too much.
Remember that?
He said, that's a total fabrication.
He said,
there was only one instance which I told you about where amnesty was ever discussed.
He said, one day in San Clemente before we went over to Hawaii, I was walking down the beach and we were talking sort of casually about this.
And I said, you know, I think a problem that may arise is these guys may want amnesty.
And then John now—and I got this this afternoon from him—said that my reaction—I hadn't realized it was so strong—was
absolutely categorical.
I said, under no circumstances, because if you give amnesty, it's condoning the crime, and I cannot do that.
And he's ready to testify to that if I release executive privilege.
And I think we ought to do it.
Certainly worth considering, yes, sir.
So you see, in all this stuff, I don't mean that I'm pure as a white lamb's tail, but God damn it, I just didn't, you know,
know about this goddamn bullshit.
Right.
That's the case we've got to build, and that's the case that's right.
Right.
The only troublesome part is this business about the Krogh deal and so forth, which I did not learn.
I now checked.
Burlick did not tell me at the time it occurred.
I did not know it in the fall when Dean learned it from Justice.
Justice had it all with Ty.
And then in March, sometime, Dean said, crew got a problem.
And I wondered what the hell the problem was.
And so there was a picture.
But there wasn't a goddamn thing I could do but to ask justice to check into it.
But then the important thing is the bottom line is that, goddammit, we turned the information over to the prosecutor.
That's right.
And with the Christ, can you complain about that?
No way.
Oh, they say you delayed, you know.
But my point is, we've got all this, but the thing is that when you look at the whole business, it's such a miserable collection of shit that what you have to do is to fight like hell and beat them.
That's right.
Does everybody agree?
Bazaar, what's he say?
He agrees totally.
Does he?
He agrees totally.
Yes, sir.
Fred's a good guy.
in this great southern way.
He's a good man.
And he's very clever.
But you say old Len is one of the best.
The guy who I'm really, really proud of anything about is Len Garment.
He's a total clear mind and he's a fighter.
I'll tell you, he is really a fighter.
Does he see all this too?
He understands.
Oh, yes, sir.
He knows that there's no...
He knows that there's no finality or crookedness about this good guy.
Oh, absolutely.
Yes, sir.
You know, it's amazing how people perform in situations like this.
And he is there.
He is right there.
Isn't that great?
And he's got a good mind.
Well, he's a...
But I mean, he's a...
I don't mean to build one guy.
I know, I know.
I know Len.
But... No, no, no.
Len is a smarter bazaar.
He's a good man.
Yeah, he really is, yeah.
You know, worked this— Lazard is more meticulous, but Lynn is more brilliant.
And Lynn has worked this thing with Pat and Ray and— Right.
A good team.
Who's doing the writing?
Ray and Pat are working together.
Yeah.
And Ray'll— Researchers— Ray'll have to do the final writing, but— Yeah.
But Pat, Pat can put the guts in.
Right.
How's Pat's far out?
Oh, Pat's fine.
Pat's good shit.
Well, the way to look at all this is that we work our ass off tomorrow, meet the leaders on Tuesday, give them a hell of a blast.
Maybe.
Maybe the leaders.
We want to talk about that a little bit tomorrow.
Oh, yes.
It might be another way to do that.
Harlow has some thoughts.
He wants to look at the draft.
Harlow's point is, look, let's consider the leaders.
Maybe it's not a leadership meeting in the cabinet room.
Maybe it's just a quiet talk with the president and the leaders.
You know, the big five?
Yes.
Over in the Lincoln sitting room or something.
Right, right.
The leaders meeting—oh, that's great.
I would much prefer that because you get them all in.
The only thing I want to do is to get Jackson in some way.
I don't know.
Maybe we do that, but Bryce wants to reserve— I would rather sort of sit with them in the cabinet room.
I'd sit around and say, look, I want to talk about this country and where we're going.
By God, here we are, boys.
See, Bryce, you know, Bryce is pretty good at this stuff.
His concern is that if we call in a big advertised leadership meeting, it's going to put too much national crisis on this thing.
And he wants to look at this draft tomorrow, and then we'll have some thoughts on that.
Same thing we were talking about earlier, speech.
Everyone is violent against that.
We kicked that around.
Oh, God.
Totally.
I mean, all we can do is that...
the consensus seems to be that the East Room press conference is out too.
No, no, no.
But about a week.
Well, we'll see.
We'll see.
We've got a couple of things we want to kick around with you on that.
You know, you get Mollenhoff up there screaming and all that stuff.
Wow.
Well, as a matter of fact,
We can do that at our own good pace, and nobody gives a shit whether we do it or not.
We'll look that over and see what we want to do, but the main thing, we don't want to move precipitously on any of this.
But you see, one of the advantages of all this is that we get this done Tuesday, and then follow up with the next day.
I hope a few stubborn-hearted men in the House and Senate Wednesday, and then Thursday we go to the POWs, which will be a hell of a show.
I mean, that's going to blank this shit out.
It really will.
Because it's, you know, it's dramatic and emotional.
Right.
And Friday we get the hell out of here and go down for Memorial Day.
Right.
And everybody else will want to do that and stay there four or five days.
Well, that's certainly something we want to look at.
I don't disagree.
I think we've got to calculate it all out tomorrow.
I certainly agree that you should go to Florida toward the end of the week.
It's how we weave all of this in, you know.
But the main thing is, Ron, the whole group has to think in terms of only one thing.
And this is the thing I know that sometimes prices and the finches and the rest, because poor Al said that he had to shore a finch up today.
I said, Al, there comes a time when you either fight or you run out.
I said, we're going to fight, and we're going to fight to the death.
And now, goddammit, everybody's got to know that.
And then, by God, that changes the whole atmosphere.
That's right.
Well, this whole team knows it.
Does everybody know this?
Absolutely.
And by God, we're going to fight and beat their ass off.
And the main thing, it's not a desperate battle.
No.
It's two different battles.
There's the desperate battle, and then there's the real...
But the point is, you fight in order to win, and you must...
But the main thing is, if you've ever given the impression...
They say, well, what do you think about resignation or what do you think about all this?
You can simply say, you're ridiculous.
Crap.
I'm ridiculous.
Yes, sir.
Because when you really come down to it, good God, you know, they think of the Russians, they think of the Chinese, they think of everything else.
Well, look at the Gallup poll today.
What was that?
The economy's up, you know, the concerns about the economy is up, and the concern about Watergate and all the rest is down about 16%.
Oh, this?
Yes, sir.
It's a gallop bull today.
So you had foreign policy on it, too?
No.
Yes, foreign policy was up there, good.
But people, you see, people don't register concern about foreign policy because they know you're handling it.
Yeah.
I remember it had a very high Gallup poll on the—about the economy, if you recall.
Right.
Seventy percent.
I'd like to see it.
I'll tell you, I'd really like to see some dramatic movement on the economy.
Yeah, I know, I know.
I've been—I just talked to Hague, and we've been kicking Schultz in the ass, you know.
Well, I don't know about the personalities.
I'm just talking about the policy itself.
I don't know about the economy, but from just a public relations standpoint, I'd sure like to knock one out.
But you're not discouraged, huh?
Not at all.
No one is.
You would be very proud of these people, the way they're working on this and the way they're acting and the way they're reacting.
Well, the main thing is you've got to look at the alternatives.
What in the name of God would happen to this country if a president should say, well, I'm sorry, I'm a little tired of the job and all this and that.
This country could become a part of the scenes.
And the important thing is the Russians would seize it, believe me.
Absolutely they would.
And that's what the people have to realize.
and the goddamn New York Times and all the other assholes that call for resignation ought to start thinking about this.
Well, I think they are calling for it.
I'll tell you another thing, and Al's done a very effective job of this, and I don't know that we have to do too much more.
A lot of people in this town, Al makes a good point.
You know, we've been kind of moving the line in our own little way about, well, you better watch out because we're going to let it all hang out.
Oh, boy.
Oh, listen.
Not only about that, but also, put on a note, the president is going to declassify the bear pigs and he's going to declassify the animals.
He's going to declassify the whole Kennedy-Johnson period.
Right.
Well, that's what I mean.
Well, Mr. President, it's out.
Now, it's out in a way that it's not blatantly out.
And Al makes a good point.
When people think this might happen, you know, anyone who is guilty, if they don't know what you have or what you're going to put out,
And we've got this stuff, we moved on that today.
It's moving around us.
And they are careful.
The one thing that hasn't moved, Ron, is that we have made a study and found that thousands of documents have been destroyed.
That's true, you know.
See, Johnson took them out.
I'd rather not people to know that they've been destroyed.
I'd rather make them think that we have more in the bag.
Okay.
Because, look, the point is that if someone is concerned about information getting out, then they are going to feel in their own consciousness that we've got a lot more of them than even we do have.
And this is what people are concerned about.
And let's just let them stew around a little bit.
Joe, the word's gone out.
through Califano, through Joe Alsop, and through different ways.
You know, don't push us too far, fellas, because if you do...
In other words, we're going to hang it all out.
That's right.
Hang out, and also hang out the Johnson tactics and the 68 campaign.
That's right, that's right.
Subtly moving out, subtly moving out.
We'll let that go.
president doesn't want to do it because of his interest in the country.
Right.
Okay.
Okay.
Well, we'll be ready tomorrow.
But your spirit's good, huh?
Yes, sir.
Everyone's good.
The thing is, your spirit should be good for a reason that none of you would appreciate.
All of you say you crashed
Wouldn't our spirit be good if we didn't have anything to do but get out and play golf or ping pong?
You're a bunch of goddamn fools.
No one thinks your spirit is no good unless you're out fighting a goddamn battle.
That's right.
Right?
That's right.
Okay.
Yes, sir.
Okay.