The real story behind Rove's demotion yesterday was not that he was "spread too thin" or that he needs to "focus on the midterms," as the traditional media universally reported. The real story is that there remains a substantial chance that Rove will be indicted by Fitzgerald in the Plamegate investigation, and the White House needs to put as much distance between Bush and Rove as possible before that event occurs.
In a breaking article today, reporter Jason Leopold managed to get Rove lawyer Robert Luskin on the record confirming that a Rove indictment remains a strong possibility:
In an interview Wednesday, Rove's attorney, Robert Luskin, confirmed that Rove remains a "subject" of Fitzgerald's two-year-old probe.
"Mr. Rove is still a subject of the investigation," Luskin said. In a previous interview, Luskin asserted that Rove would not be indicted by Fitzgerald, but he was unwilling to make that prediction again Wednesday.
"Mr. Fitzgerald hasn't made any decision on the charges and I can't speculate what the outcome will be," Luskin said. "Mr. Rove has cooperated completely with the investigation."
That's about as weak a defense of Rove as I've seen Luskin offer throughout this whole Plamegate affair. Reading between the lines, Luskin knows things are dead serious, and he doesn't want to engage in delusional happy talk that could undercut his credibility later.
Leopold's reporting from anonymous sources confirms this:
Just as the news broke Wednesday about Scott McClellan resigning as White House press secretary and Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove shedding some of his policy duties, Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald met with the grand jury hearing evidence in the CIA leak case and introduced additional evidence against Rove, attorneys and other US officials close to the investigation said.
The grand jury session in federal court in Washington, DC, sources close to the case said, was the first time this year that Fitzgerald told the jurors that he would soon present them with a list of criminal charges he intends to file against Rove in hopes of having the grand jury return a multi-count indictment against Rove.
If Leopold is right, fasten your seatbelts. Fitzmas II may be just around the corner.