Posted on 03/14/2002 5:59:57 AM PST by LibFreeUSA
March 13 — Saying he was “stunned and not happy,” President Bush ordered an investigation Wednesday into the “embarrassing disclosure” that two of the Sept. 11 hijackers were granted visas shortly before the attacks even though they were known to law enforcement agencies and one had an outstanding arrest warrant. Bush said the “interesting wake-up call” demonstrated the need for reform at the Immigration and Naturalization Service.
BUSH CALLED the mailing of the visa approvals “inexcusable” at a news conference Wednesday afternoon, saying it was further evidence that the INS’s “information systems are antiquated.”
“It got my attention this morning. ... Let me put it another way: I was hot, and I made that clear to people in my administration,” the president said.
Bush said he had particularly made his displeasure plain to Attorney General John Ashcroft, head of the Justice Department, the INS’s parent agency. “He got the message,” the president said, “and so should the INS.”
Ashcroft issued a statement saying he had directed the department’s inspector general to investigate. “Individuals will be held responsible for any professional incompetence that led to this failure,” he said, “and inferior INS quality-control mechanisms will be reformed.”
Bush’s swift reaction reflected outrage that spread through Washington like wildfire after MSNBC.com and WBBH-TV, the NBC affiliate in Fort Myers, Fla., reported Tuesday afternoon that the head of a Florida aviation school received notices that the INS had approved requests by the two terrorist pilots....
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