Thomas H.

Kean August 19, 2003

CHAIR

Lee H. Hamilton
VICE CHAIR
The Honorable John Ashcroft
Richard Ben-Veniste Attorney General
Max Cleland
Department of Justice
10th Street and Constitution Avenue, NW
Frederick F. Fielding Washington, DC 20530-0001
Jamie S. Oorelick
Dear Mr. Attorney General:
Slade Gorton

John F. Lehman
Public Law 107-306 directs the Commission to investigate the facts and
circumstances surrounding the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, including
Timothy J. Roemer the nation's preparedness for and immediate response to those attacks. We are
James R. Thompson
also mandated to identify and evaluate lessons learned and make
recommendations for the future. The statute authorizes the Commission to
secure needed information directly from any agency. The Commission has
Philip D. Zelikow
DIRECTOR
thus made numerous requests for documents and discussions with officials
from your department. Given the extraordinary character of the 9/11 events
and our mandate, the scope and sensitivity of our requests have few, if any,
precedents.

We are therefore all the more grateful for the efforts you and your colleagues
have made so far to deal with our many, necessary requests. With so many
other issues confronting you and your staff, we do understand how hard this
can be. We try to make appropriate allowances when we know people are
doing their best. In July the Commission issued an interim report on our
progress so far. In that report we said the coming weeks would be critical.
We promised another report in September that would appraise whettter the
level of voluntary cooperation is sufficient so that we will be able to do the job
we are charged to do under the statute.

That time is now approaching. You are entitled to some advance notice of
what we need. To make such a decisive appraisal and properly evaluate your
department's cooperation, we will assess:

1. Your policy choices—one way or another—on every access issue posed by

our pending requests.

2. Whether we actually receive the most important categories of documents

that are already overdue. We will follow up to be sure our points of
contact know which overdue documents we regard as litmus
301 7'h Street SW, Room 5125
tests for effective cooperation.
Washington, DC 20407
T 202.331.4060 F 202.296.5545
www.9-llcommission.gov
The Honorable John Ashcroft
August 19,2003
Page 2

We understand that you and your staff may need a few more weeks to finalize
policy choices and push through delivery of key documents. Therefore we
think it is reasonable to wait and assess the situation based on positions
communicated with us and documents that have actually been delivered or
otherwise made available to us by COB on Friday, September 5, 2003. r

As the second anniversary of the devastating attacks on our country

approaches, we thank you for working with us to meet the challenge of
understanding how and why America suffered such a devastating attack, and
how to prevent another.

Sincerely,

Thomas H. Kean Lee H. Hamilton

Chair Vice Chair

cc: M. Faith Burton

 August 26,2003

Thomas H. Kean MEMORANDUM

CHAIR

Lee H Hamilton
VICE CHAIR To: Faith Burton, Department of Justice
Richard Ben-Veniste
From: Daniel Marcus, General Counsel
Maxdeland

Fred F. Fielding Subj: Most Important Overdue Documents

Jamie S. Gorelick

Skde Gorton As a follow-up to the letter to the Attorney General dated August 19,
2003, here are the most important categories of documents requested by
John Lehman
the Commission that are overdue:
TimothyJ. Roemer
DOJ Document Request No. 2 - All items, to the extent not already
James R. Thompson
produced
Philip D.Zelikow
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR DOJ Document Request No. 4 - Items l(a)-(e)

We look forward to the Department's prompt production of these

overdue items, as well as positions on access to all of the documents
responsive to all of our outstanding requests, as set forth in the August 19
letter. If you have any questions, please give me a call.

cc: Dan Levin, DOJ

TEL (202) 331-4060

FAX (202) 296-5545
www.9-1 lcommission.gov
 U.S. Department of Justice

Office of Legislative Affairs

Office of the Assistant Attorney General Washington, D.C. 20530

September 5, 2003

Dan Marcus, General Counsel

National Commission on Terrorist Attacks
Upon the United States
2100 K Street, NW, Suite 300
Washington, DC 20036

Dear Mr. Marcus:

This responds to the letter from the Chair and Vice Chair of the Commission to the
Attorney General, dated August 19, 2003, and to your follow up memorandum to Faith Burton,
dated August 26, 2003.

Based on our review of documents and the Commission's requests to the Department to
date, we have granted access to all documents responsive to the Commission's requests and we
are not currently aware of any responsive documents as to which we would not grant access as
defined in the September 5, 2003 letter from Dan Levin to Phil Zelikow. Because of the unique
nature of the Commission's work, and in a spirit of accommodation, this has included
extraordinary access to extremely sensitive classified and deliberative documents. We are
continuing to review documents (and you are continuing to request them) and if there are any
documents for which we would seek some other accommodation, we would of course discuss
that with you immediately.

With respect to the documents identified in the August 26, 2003, memorandum:

1. As to Document Request 2 - we have reviewed most of the potentially responsive

documents and to date have provided access to all responsive documents. We are continuing to
review documents - primarily some highly classified documents and other documents that had to
be recalled from storage. We expect to complete the review of these documents by the end of
September, although we will endeavor to complete it sooner (and will continue to produce
documents on a rolling basis). We are not aware of any documents in these materials that will
raise any additional access issues but, of course, we cannot be sure until we have completed our
review of them.

2. As to Document Request 4 - the responsive documents were actually in possession of

the FBI. However, in an effort to accommodate your request, we are obtaining and reviewing
them. If they contain information relevant to the Commission's work, we will discuss with you
ways to make the information available consistent with protection of ongoing investigations. I
anticipate that we will complete this process by September 19, 2003.
 The Department is committed to cooperating with the Commission as it continues its
important work. Please do not hesitate to call me if you have any concerns about this matter.

Sincerely,

William E. Moschella
Assistant Attorney General