Nixon White House Tapes › Tape 919 › Conversation 919-015

Nixon & Ziegler on Watergate and John Dean

Wednesday, May 16, 1973 · 10:27 AM–10:31 AM ET · Oval Office · 3 min

ParticipantsNixon, Richard M. (President); Ziegler, Ronald L.; [Unknown person(s)]Conversation919-015 on Tape 919StartWednesday, May 16, 1973 at 10:27 AMEndWednesday, May 16, 1973 at 10:31 AMRecording deviceOval OfficeSourceNixon Library record for 919-015 ↗

AI Summary

President Nixon and Ronald Ziegler discuss the political fallout of the Watergate scandal, specifically focusing on John Dean’s documents regarding 1970 domestic intelligence coordination and their classification status. They also address John B. Connally’s advocacy for a broad staff "housecleaning" that would remove figures like H.R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman. Nixon rejects the necessity of such drastic personnel changes, particularly regarding the State Department, citing the complexity of upcoming Soviet summit negotiations.

Audio

Download MP3 · 6.1 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 Do not cite it as authoritative — verify against the audio and the finding aid.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).

You heard?

No.

You were right.

Fred talked about last night that he came out, but it had nothing to do with Watergate, whatever.

It was the operation we set up in 1917 for the purpose of internal...

a court in CIA, NSA, and FBI, in Hoover's direction, for the purpose of getting all of our internal intelligence, foreign intelligence, if you know what I mean, intelligence that had to do with the related foreign, domestic, and all coordinated in one pot, which there had never been before.

That's what it was.

Nothing more?

That's all.

What was the 43 page report?

That is that.

That is about that.

And eight supplementary documents.

It was an old recording of how it was to be done.

Tom Houston worked on it.

You remember him?

Yeah.

He was the White House aide on it.

The White House aide.

You remember Houston working on it.

But that's about it.

And it is totally irrelevant.

He was told it.

And it's all highly classified.

It's all super secret stuff.

so listen today we start to fight again i guess certainly i mean i was worried about it because i heard about it i'm uh

I don't think that's right, Ron.

I mean, I don't think that.

I have the greatest respect for it, and I think it's valuable and so forth, but the idea that we just throw everybody off the nerve if they've ever had anything to do with home and Irwin and so forth and so on is just a goddamn ridiculous thing.

And then, of course, he says change state.

You can't change state before the summit.

He doesn't know how intricate this is.

He has no idea.

Well, I had dinner with him.

Were you able to talk about it?

Well, I think so.

See, he comes in, quite frankly, with a broad brush.

He says, you know, everyone has got to go.

It's got to be a complete housecleaning.

He didn't say this to me, but apparently he said that to Hay, but not to me, which is interesting.

He said that even Ziegler's got to move on because of the free pieces.

forth well we talked about that before maybe afterwards too this is another role i can assume if you want me to you know well if i mean or not maybe i mean well that's not even relevant now but that's his point of view i think however that that conley can be that he can be

restrain a little bit on this, and contribute enormously, not in terms of energy and training and all that other stuff, but in bringing some, not gutting the place, but bringing some new people in.

He saw me.

I'm going to go up to him.

NARA Description

On May 16, 1973, President Richard M. Nixon, Ronald L. Ziegler, and unknown person(s) met in the Oval Office of the White House from 10:27 am to 10:31 am. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 919-015 of the White House Tapes.

Nixon Library Finding Aid

Conversation No. 919-15

Date: May 16, 1973
Time: 10:27 am - 10:31 am
Location: Oval Office

The President met with Ronald L. Ziegler.

       Watergate
             -John W. Dean III’s documents
                    -Contents
                           -1970 domestic intelligence coordination
                                   -Central Intelligence Agency [CIA]
                                   -National Security Agency [NSA]
                                   -Federal Bureau of Investigation [FBI]
                                   -J. Edgar Hoover
                                   -Tom C. Huston
                                            -18-

                    NIXON PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARY AND MUSEUM

                                                            Conversation No. 919-15 (cont’d)

               -White House response

       John B. Connally
              -Opinion regarding White House staff resignations
                     -President’s response
                            -H. R. (“Bob”) Haldeman, John D. Ehrlichman
                     -Secretary of State
                            -Soviet summit
                                    -Intricacy
              -Dinner with Ziegler
              -Opinion regarding White House staff resignations
                     -Housecleaning
                            -Haldeman, Ehrlichman
                     -Conversation with Alexander M. Haig, Jr.
                            -Ziegler’s departure
                                    -Briefings
                                            -New role
                                            -Replacement

An unknown man entered at an unknown time after 10:27 am.

       Connally’s arrival

The unknown man left at an unknown time before 10:31 am.

       Connally
             -Possible role on White House staff

       Ziegler’s schedule

Ziegler left at 10:31 am.
                                             -19-

                   NIXON PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARY AND MUSEUM

Also recorded on May 16, 1973

919-010 9:54 AM · 13 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House at 9:54 am.
046-076 10:23 AM · 12 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and White House operator talked on the telephone at an unknown time between 10:23 am and 10:25 am.
919-012 10:23 AM · 17 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and unknown person(s) met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 10:23 am and 10:25 am.
919-013 10:23 AM · 9 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and White House operator met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 10:23 am and 10:25 am.
046-077 10:25 AM · 1 min — President Richard M. Nixon and J. Fred Buzhardt, Jr. talked on the telephone from 10:25 am to 10:27 am.
919-014 10:25 AM · 1 min — President Richard M. Nixon and J. Fred Buzhardt, Jr. met in the Oval Office of the White House from 10:25 am to 10:27 am.
919-016 10:31 AM · 18 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and unknown person(s) met in the Oval Office of the White House at 10:31 am.
919-017 10:31 AM · 1 hr 41 min — President Richard M. Nixon and John B. Connally met in the Oval Office of the White House from 10:31 am to 11:35 am.

All 73 conversations from May 16, 1973 →

Cite this conversation

Conversation 919-015, May 16, 1973. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives. Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/919-015 (accessed October 12, 2026).