ABC Ships Uranium Overseas for Story Federal Officials Call Test a Crime
By Howard Kurtz Washington Post Staff Writer
ABC News says it has exposed a crucial weakness in the nation's port security system by shipping depleted uranium from Jakarta, Indonesia, to Los Angeles. Federal officials say the network seems to have committed a crime.
"We feel this is a very valid and important test," ABC News spokesman Jeffrey Schneider said yesterday. "This is what journalists do. . . . It was not our intent to defraud the U.S."
But Homeland Security Department spokesman Dennis Murphy said that "it appears they violated the law, and the Justice Department is taking a look at that. Does a news organization have a right to break the law? Can a reporter rob a bank to prove that bank security is weak? My understanding of journalistic ethics is you don't break the law in pursuit of news."
The government's response to the undercover operation by ABC prompted a strong letter from Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) to Attorney General John D. Ashcroft and Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge.
"I would urge that significant caution must be used by the federal government to ensure that legitimate reporting is not chilled," Grassley wrote, adding: "If my neighbor told me my barn was on fire, my first instinct would be to thank my neighbor and get some water for the fire. . . . Time and again, I find federal agencies devoting enormous time and energy to attacking whoever put the spotlight on a government mistake."
The report by ABC's Brian Ross, scheduled to air tonight on "Primetime Thursday," involves 15 pounds of lead-encased uranium put in a teak trunk along with other furniture in Jakarta, a terrorist hot spot.
Shipping depleted uranium, which cannot be converted to weapons use, is legal. But Murphy said the network "failed to disclose the contents accurately, which is a false declaration."
Schneider countered: "Do you think terrorists are going to fill out a form saying they're shipping uranium? That's the point of the test."
The two sides differed sharply on the importance of the test. Murphy said depleted uranium does not give off the same radioactive signals as the active kind, and that federal devices "are geared up for the real thing."
But ABC quoted a nuclear physicist with the Natural Resources Defense Council, which provided the uranium, as saying that if federal inspectors "can't detect that, then they can't detect the real thing."
Murphy also contended that his department used its contacts to crack the case. But Schneider said the government was notified only after an ABC camera crew identified itself to a truck driver hired by the network, who had become suspicious that U.S. Customs agents had missed something at the Los Angeles port.
ABC questioned why federal investigators interviewed some of the network's staffers, demanded their videotapes and showed up unannounced at the Washington home of the NRDC physicist working with the network.
Murphy said the agents did not know that reporters were involved when they began their investigation. He noted that terrorists, such as members of al Qaeda, have posed as journalists in the past.
ABC also breached port security last year when it shipped the same batch of uranium to the Staten Island, N.Y., port.