Nixon White House Tapes › Tape 905 › Conversation 905-019

Nixon & Kleindienst on Watergate scandal and John Dean

Thursday, April 26, 1973 · 12:23 PM–12:32 PM ET · Oval Office · 9 min

ParticipantsNixon, Richard M. (President); Kleindienst, Richard G.Conversation905-019 on Tape 905StartThursday, April 26, 1973 at 12:23 PMEndThursday, April 26, 1973 at 12:32 PMRecording deviceOval OfficeSourceNixon Library record for 905-019 ↗

AI Summary

President Nixon met with Attorney General Richard Kleindienst to strategize on the burgeoning Watergate scandal and manage the legal and political liability posed by White House Counsel John Dean. The discussion focused on the necessity of portraying unauthorized activities—specifically the break-in—as independent actions while expressing deep skepticism regarding Dean's credibility and his potential to use damaging information as leverage against the administration. Nixon emphasized his desire to avoid a cover-up while simultaneously debating how to handle immunity and the risks of Dean testifying before the Senate.

Audio

Download MP3 · 15.8 MB

Transcript (AI-generated)

This transcript was generated automatically by AI (WhisperX) and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Names and numbers are often wrong; speakers are not identified. Do not cite it as authoritative — verify against the audio and the finding aid.

Download transcript (.txt) · JSON data

· Click a timestamp to play from that point; the page address then links to that moment (e.g. #t=125).
Hello.
Oh, Dan.
I forgot to tell you.
Please give me a call on any development on the self-reporting thing.
I'm sick.
I don't know how to react here.
Matter of fact, I prefer to have Dan here react in the most way.
I think it's much more responsible.
If it comes out the other way, I'll let it come.
You know what I mean?
We've done the right thing.
We've done
clowns or get out and do such stupid goddamn things, it's like we've got to take the money for it.
You know?
How?
Oh yeah, that, that.
And you know it was not authorized.
This is a case where these guys had the responsibility when they were at the White House to conduct the investigation in Ellsworth to do the fact that Hoover would not.
And so they go out and do this sort of thing.
Yeah.
Just say this was totally unauthorized.
And that's things said.
Just frankly, as a matter of fact, I think that that would be John Mitchell's defense in my opinion, that it wasn't authorized.
Don't you agree?
Oh, right.
Dean, I don't know.
I thought, I guess, Dick, you're absolutely right, though, with Dean on this business of letting black men on the body.
I mean, Dean is saying everything.
And Dean is basically what the problem is.
And it's too damn bad, because he thought he was doing it right.
it it looks to me like on one point you couldn't possibly you know that is because it doesn't involve anybody else and that's the very critical meeting he had where he told mcgruder how to testify would you agree probably i mean they couldn't count mcgruder's going to say that and how can what's being us say is denying
See, because he's, I don't think, he's never told me that he's totally going to testify.
Thank God, so that if I did, I didn't let it go right away.
He's never told me that he's done anything with regard to this whole financial operation, except pass the law.
Or pass the law, except to pass it.
Except to pass the law, but he was in it.
He was in it.
But the fight is, my own view is that with his frame of mind,
He mentioned this was the way to give Irving a kick in the ass, and I know, so he did it.
So, okay, but Ziegler makes an interesting point that happened to Kurt and me, and I've made another review.
He said, did he get up and say that the day was the night, and at the present time, his credibility is enormously thin, you know what I mean?
I mean, Eric Dean was supposed to have made a report, and it proved out to be false, and so forth and so on.
You get my point?
And Dean can say, well, that he spoke to the Attorney General, or he spoke to the, she won't, of course, but that he spoke to the Assistant Attorney General, which he did, of course, or he spoke even to the President.
I don't, I don't think he could go that, I don't think he's going to go that far speaking to the President, but he could, you know.
I mean, I would, I would, I think that even he would not do that, but your guess would be better.
I don't know the man that well.
But on his day, suppose he does.
I mean, there's a desperate man who is misled and so forth and so on.
There's an old story that we don't strike a king unless you kill him.
And he's got to remember that.
Eddie.
That's right.
That's right.
Take it away.
That's my deal.
Except this.
I don't want to be in the position of covering up for a hire.
And I said, if he's got something that he wants to tell you about or hold on that he won't tell you without getting in or anything, you've got to work it out, whatever it takes to work it out.
But I said, don't get him in the Senate alive.
You know what I mean?
But, you see, they can't.
They can't even do that.
But I say they can only give you, apparently, what we were talking about there.
They can use it, of course, but transactional energy is another thing that's much more limited since the 1970 statute.
Is that correct?
and jesus christ i mean that they couldn't possibly give him immunity for example what because that doesn't involve or am i wrong we gotta i think this in the present time i really think that the thing to do is to they gotta they gotta sit down
Do what you want.
I didn't have to call.
I don't think he could be taking the typewriter right now.
You think so?
What do you think he'll do?
Call him then?
All right.
Yep.
What he says, and he talks about with the president, no blackmail.
No blackmail.
Because if it's going to be Dean's word against mine, and he would be lying, he's going to have one hell of a time.
What do you think?
Yeah.
Well, he said he's got his, you know, his, what is he called, a big bomb, or his trump card.
You know, his trump card could be anything.
Peterson, maybe it's him, maybe it's Kierkegaard, I don't think so.
I think what his trump card is is that he's got all this information on Erdogan, and maybe that the president is denying, denying anything to him, or to Erdogan and all of them, or that could be a trump card.
Or he could say that, uh, he could expose another thing, and well, he informed the president that he had to know the market money version too.
That's what, of course, triggered my whole reaction to the informant, the fact that they're, uh, amongst people who are requiring money, which was my first knowledge of, believe me, of the whole thing.
And, but of course, that's, that's not going to be a damn good Trump card, because that's the way I took over the investigation myself.
And frankly, just from your question, I relieved him of,
He either crumbles it or he then flattles it out in the wildest possible way.
Which he might do.
Why would you think that?
Because, right?
Because basically, he is not going to be able to eat the monoculture.
Or even if he will, could he establish believability in a monoculture?
Okay, bud.
All right, call me if everything's well with this thing.
Just let me hear it.

NARA Description

On April 26, 1973, President Richard M. Nixon and Richard G. Kleindienst met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 12:23 pm and 12:32 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 905-019 of the White House Tapes.

Nixon Library Finding Aid

Conversation No. 905-19

Date: April 26, 1973
Time: 12:23 pm - 12:32 pm
Location: Oval Office

The President talked with Richard G. Kleindienst.

[See Conversation No. 45-5]
                                             -23-

                   NIXON PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARY AND MUSEUM

Also recorded on April 26, 1973

  • 045-003 12:16 PM · 6 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Richard G. Kleindienst talked on the telephone from 12:16 pm to 12:21 pm.
  • 905-017 12:16 PM · 7 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Richard G. Kleindienst met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 12:16 pm and 12:21 pm.
  • 045-004 12:21 PM · 10 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and White House operator talked on the telephone at an unknown time between 12:21 pm and 12:23 pm.
  • 905-018 12:21 PM · 13 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and White House operator met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 12:21 pm and 12:23 pm.
  • 045-005 12:23 PM · 9 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Richard G. Kleindienst talked on the telephone from 12:23 pm to 12:32 pm.
  • 905-020 12:32 PM · 1 min — United States Secret Service agents met in the Oval Office of the White House on an unknown date, sometime between 12:32 pm on April 26, 1973 and 7:32 am on April 27, 1973.
  • 045-006 12:34 PM · 12 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and White House operator talked on the telephone at an unknown time between 12:34 pm and 1:13 pm.
  • 431-001 12:34 PM · 38 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 12:34 pm and 1:13 pm.

All 73 conversations from April 26, 1973 →

Cite this conversation

Conversation 905-019, April 26, 1973. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives. Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/905-019 (accessed October 5, 2026).