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Bush, Blanco spar over military, visit
Blanco says Army brought attitude, not resources

By Bill Walsh Robert Travis Scott and Jan Moller
Staff writers

BATON ROUGE - Even as teams of engineers worked to patch ruptured levees in New Orleans, a political breach opened between Gov. Kathleen Blanco and President Bush over who is in charge of the post-Hurricane Katrina recovery effort.

One flashpoint came over the weekend, when Blanco said she rebuffed an attempt by the White House to seize control of the mounting military presence in Louisiana, including thousands of state National Guard forces under her authority. Then Bush made an unusual return visit to the state Monday, just days after surveying the damage - a trip that members of Blanco's staff said caught them by surprise and caused a certain level of consternation.

"We had no idea the president was coming," said Blanco's communications director, Robert Mann, adding that the governor was forced to cancel a trip to visit evacuees in Houston so she could meet with Bush.

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Blanco said that when the plain-spoken, cigar-chomping Honore showed up in New Orleans late last week, she thought that her worries about a lack of federal troops and resource were over. Honore quickly became a media darling and the take-charge face of the federal government in New Orleans, barking out orders to surprised National Guards members who aren't even under his control.

Blanco said she liked Honore's style, but was surprised that he arrived with only a few aides in tow.

"He didn't bring any resources," Blanco said. "I just kind of expected, based on my conversations with the White House, that we could be getting a surge of equipment, and we did not."

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Friday night, the White House moved to take charge of all the troops in Louisiana. At home, Blanco received a memorandum of understanding from the White House asking her to cede control of the National Guard. According to her staff, Blanco was asked to sign and return the document right away. Blanco consulted with her legal counsel, Terry Ryder, and then refused the request.

"They wanted to take over my National Guard," Blanco said in an interview. "A governor has to have the final say on what's going to happen."

Bartlett said the request was made for efficiency's sake to streamline the chain of command and improve the efficiency of the recovery. He dismissed suggestions that it was done because Blanco is a Democrat.

"We were in the same discussions with (Republican Mississippi Gov.) Haley Barbour," Bartlett said. "This was not about politics."
In what some saw as a not-so-subtle snub, Blanco over the weekend hired a former Clinton administration disaster response chief, James Lee Witt, as an adviser.

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Early Monday morning, Blanco was in Baton Rouge preparing to fly to Houston to meet with thousands of Louisiana refugees when she received news that Bush was on his way. Blanco Chief of Staff Andy Kopplin called the White House and got word from Bush Chief of Staff Andrew Card that the president was planning to return to Louisiana in a few hours to follow up on his Friday visit.

The White House notified the media Sunday about the trip. But Blanco aide Bob Mann said Blanco was assured Sunday by the Federal Emergency Management Agency that Bush was not coming. FEMA spokeswoman Nicol Andrews said agency Director Michael Brown knew about the Bush visit but that many lower-level officials didn't, and that was probably why the Blanco administration wasn't notified.

Bartlett said "there was outreach" to the governor's office, "e-mails sent, messages left."

"We apologize if there was any confusion," he said. A Bush visit to Louisiana at a time when Blanco was out of the state would have been a major embarrassment for the governor. It could also have sent the message that Bush, who has been criticized for not moving quickly enough to help Louisiana, was in charge on the ground.

Blanco abruptly canceled the trip to Houston. Bush downplayed suggestions of a state-federal spat.

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