Gorelick allowed to draft report

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September 11 commission member Jamie S. Gorelick, who recused herself from questioning some Clinton administration officials last week, still can help draft parts of the board's final report on the "wall" between intelligence and law enforcement that she defended while in the Clinton Justice Department.

Al Felzenberg, spokesman for the commission, said Ms. Gorelick's recusal applies to the time she was deputy attorney general at the Justice Department, so she is free to take part in the investigation and drafting of the report for anything that happened after she left.

That, he said, includes the legal barrier known as "the wall," which prevented the sharing of information between law-enforcement and intelligence officials.

"The wall as it existed after she left, the wall as it existed in the beginning of the Bush administration, she's perfectly free to ask questions about," Mr. Felzenberg said.

Faced with her refusal to resign and what some of them have called a "circus" atmosphere at recent commission meetings, Republicans in the House, just back from a two-week recess, are stepping up their criticism.

At the weekly meeting of the House Republican Conference yesterday, Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas urged his colleagues to take the case to the public. And many of them already are doing that.

"The commission findings need to have truth and credibility, and with her remaining on the commission, that will not be the end result," said Rep. Ginny Brown-Waite, Florida Republican. "For her to recuse herself on several issues still does not answer what I think most Americans want to know -- and that is what she knows."

And Rep. Jack Kingston, Georgia Republican, said the commission's members haven't impressed anyone.

"The commission is a reunion of political has-beens who haven't had face time since 'Seinfeld' was a weekly show," he said. "In their scramble to make the evening news, they've turned this grave matter into a get-even-for-Monica investigation -- a switch the American people see right through."

Attorney General John Ashcroft last week released a memo that Ms. Gorelick wrote in 1995, which he said showed she was responsible for bolstering the wall, which he said was a critical problem that led to the September 11 terrorist attacks.