TRANSCRIPT OF A RECORDING OF A
MEETING BETWEEN THE PRESIDENT
AND H.R. HALDEMAN IN THE OVAL
OFFICE ON JUNE 23, 1972 FROM
10:04 TO 11:39 AM
June 23, 1972 FROM 10:04 TO 11:39 AM 3
**********
HALDEMAN: okay -that's fine. Now, on the investi-
gation, you know, the Democratic break-in
thing, we're back to the-in the, the problem
area because the FBI is not under control,
because Gray doesn't exactly know how to
control them, and they have, their
investigation is now leading into some
productive areas, because they've been able
to trace the money, not through the money
itself, but through the bank, you know,
sources - the banker himself. And, and it
goes in some directions we don't want it to
go. Ah, also there have been some things,
like an informant came in off the street to
the FBI in Miami, who was a photographer or
has a friend who is a photographer who
developed some films through this guy,
Barker, and the films had pictures of
Democratic National Committee letter head
documents and things. So I guess, so it's
things like that that are gonna, that are
filtering in. Mitchell came up with
yesterday, and John Dean analyzed very
carefully last night and concludes, concurs
now with Mitchell's recommendation that the
only way to solve this, and we're set up
beautifully to do it, ah, in that and
that...the only network that paid any
attention to it last night was NBC...they
did a massive story on the Cuban...
PRESIDENT: That's right.
HALDEMAN: thing.
PRESIDENT: Right.
HALDEMAN: That the way to handle this now is for us to
have Walters call Pat Gray and just say,
"Stay the hell out of this...this is ah,
business here we don't want you to go any
further on it." That's not an unusual
development,...
PRESIDENT: Um huh.
JUNE 23, 1972 FROM 10:04 TO 11:39 AM 4
HALDEMAN: ...and, uh, that would take care of it.
PRESIDENT: What about Pat Gray, ah, you mean he doesn't
want to?
HALDEMAN: Pat does want to. He doesn't know how to,
and he doesn't have, he doesn't have any
basis for doing it. Given this, he will
then have the basis. He'll call Mark Felt
in, and the two of them ...and Mark Felt
wants to cooperate because...
PRESIDENT: Yeah.
HALDEMAN: he's ambitious...
PRESIDENT: Yeah.
HALDEMAN: Ah, he'll call him in and say, "We've got
the signal from across the river to, to put
the hold on this." And that will fit rather
well because the FBI agents who are working
the case, at this point, feel that's what it
is. This is CIA.
PRESIDENT: But they've traced the money to 'em.
HALDEMAN: Well they have, they've traced to a name,
but they haven't gotten to the guy yet.
PRESIDENT: Would it be somebody here?
HALDEMAN: Ken Dahlberg.
PRESIDENT: Who the hell is Ken Dahlberg?
HALDEMAN: He's ah, he gave $25,000 in Minnesota and
ah, the check went directly in to this, to
this guy Barker.
PRESIDENT: Maybe he's a ...bum.
JUNE 23, 1972 FROM 10:04 TO 11:39 AM 5
PRESIDENT: He didn't get this from the committee
though, from Stans.
HALDEMAN: Yeah. It is. It is. It's directly
traceable and there's some more through some
Texas people in--that went to the Mexican
bank which they can also trace to the
Mexican bank...they'll get their names
today. And pause)
PRESIDENT: Well, I mean, ah, there's no way... I'm just
thinking if they don't cooperate, what do
they say? They they, they were approached
by the Cubans. That's what Dahlberg has to
say, the Texans too. Is that the idea?
HALDEMAN: Well, if they will. But then we're relying
on more and more people all the time.
That's the problem. And ah, they'll stop if
we could, if we take this other step.
PRESIDENT: All right. Fine.
HALDEMAN: And, and they seem to feel the thing to do
is get them to stop?
PRESIDENT: Right, fine.
HALDEMAN: They say the only way to do that is from
White House instructions. And it's got to
be to Helms and, ah, what's his name...?
Walters.
PRESIDENT: Walters.
HALDEMAN: And the proposal would be that Ehrlichman
(coughs) and I call them in
PRESIDENT: All right, fine.
HALDEMAN: and say, ah...
JUNE 23, 1972 FROM 10:04 TO 11:39 AM 6
PRESIDENT: How do you call him in, I mean you just,
well, we protected Helms from one hell of a
lot of things.
HALDEMAN: That's what Ehrlichman says.
PRESIDENT: Of course, this is a, this is a Hunt, you
will-that will uncover a lot of things. You
open that scab there's a hell of a lot of
things and that we just feel that it would
be very detrimental to have this thing go
any further. This involves these Cubans,
Hunt, and a lot of hanky-panky that we have
nothing to do with ourselves. Well what the
hell, did Mitchell know about this thing to
any much of a degree?
HALDEMAN: I think so. I don 't think he knew the
details, but I think he knew.
PRESIDENT: He didn't know how it was going to be
handled though, with Dahlberg and the Texans
and so forth? Well who was the asshole that
did? (Unintelligible) Is it Liddy? Is that
the fellow? He must be a little nuts.
HALDEMAN: He is.
PRESIDENT: I mean he just isn't well screwed on is he?
Isn't that the problem?
HALDEMAN: No, but he was under pressure, apparently,
to get more information, and as he got more
pressure, he pushed the people harder to
move harder on...
PRESIDENT: Pressure from Mitchell?
HALDEMAN: Apparently.
PRESIDENT: Oh, Mitchell, Mitchell was at the point that
you made on this, that exactly what I need
from you is on the--
HALDEMAN: Gemstone, yeah.
JUNE 23, 1972 FROM 10:04 TO 11:39 AM 7
PRESIDENT: All right, fine, I understand it all. We
won't second-guess Mitchell and the rest.
Thank God it wasn't Colson.
HALDEMAN: The FBI interviewed Colson yesterday. They
determined that would be a good thing to do.
PRESIDENT: Um hum.
HALDEMAN: Ah, to have him take a...
PRESIDENT: Um hum.
HALDEMAN: An interrogation, which he did, and that,
the FBI guys working the case had concluded
that there were one or two possibilities,
one, that this was a White House, they don't
think that there is anything at the Election
Committee, they think it was either a White
House operation and they had some obscure
reasons for it, non political,...
PRESIDENT: Uh huh.
HALDEMAN: or it was a...
PRESIDENT: Cuban thing-
HALDEMAN: Cubans and the CIA. And after their
interrogation of, of...
PRESIDENT: Colson.
HALDEMAN: Colson, yesterday, they concluded it was not
the White House, but are now convinced it is
a CIA thing, so the CIA turn off would...
PRESIDENT: Well, not sure of their analysis, I'm not
going to get that involved. I'm
(unintelligible).
HALDEMAN: No, sir. We don't want you to.
JUNE 23, 1972 FROM 10:04 to 11:39 AM 8 (repl. 10/28/74)
PRESIDENT: You call them in.
PRESIDENT: Good. Good deal! Play it tough. That's the
way they play it and that's the way we are
going to play it.
HALDEMAN: O.K. We'll do it.
PRESIDENT: Yeah, when I saw that news summary item, I
of course knew it was a bunch of crap, but I
thought ah, well it's good to have them off
on this wild hair thing because when they
start bugging us, which they have, we'll
know our little boys will not know how to
handle it. I hope they will though. You
never know. Maybe, you think about it.
Good!
HALDEMAN: Mosbacher has resigned.
PRESIDENT: Oh yeah?
HALDEMAN: As we expected he would.
PRESIDENT: Yeah.
HALDEMAN: He's going back to private life
(unintelligible) Do you want to sign this or
should I send it to Rose?
PRESIDENT: Ah, yeah (scratching noise)
HALDEMAN: Do you want to release it?
PRESIDENT: O.K. Great. Good job, Bob.
HALDEMAN: Kissinger?
PRESIDENT: Huh? That's a joke.
HALDEMAN: Is it? Ah, O.K.
JUNE 23, 1972 FROM 10:04 TO 11:39 AM 16
PRESIDENT: I don't know, maybe it isn't worth going out
and talking (unintelligible) Maybe it is.
HALDEMAN: Well, it's a close call. Ah, Ehrlichman
though you'd, you probably, he, he...
PRESIDENT: What?
HALDEMAN: Well, he said you probably didn't need it.
He didn't think you should, now at all. He
said he felt fine doing it.
PRESIDENT: He did? The question, the point is, does he
think everybody is going to understand about
the bussing?
HALDEMAN: That's right.
PRESIDENT: And, ah, well Lonzo says no.
HALDEMAN: Well, this, the fact is somewhere in
between, I think, because I think that is
missing some...
PRESIDENT: Well, if the fact is somewhere in between,
we better do it.
HALDEMAN: Yeah, I think Mitchell says, "Hell yes.
Anything we can hit on at anytime we get the
chance...and we've got a reason for doing
it... do it."
**********
PRESIDENT: When you get in these people when you...get
these people in, say: "Look, the problem is
that this will open the whole, the whole Bay
of Pigs thing, and the President just feels
that" ah, without going into the details...
don't, don't lie to them to the extent to
say there is no involvement, but just say
this is sort of a comedy of errors, bizarre,
without getting into it, "the President
believes that it is going to open the whole
Bay of Pigs thing up again. And, ah because
these people are plugging for, for keeps and
that they should call the FBI in and say
that we wish for the country, don't go any
further into this case", period!
JUNE 23, 1972 FROM 10 04 TO 11:39 AM 17
HALDEMAN: OK
PRESIDENT: That's the way to put it, do it straight
(Unintelligible)
HALDEMAN: Get more done for our cause by the
opposition than by us at this point.
PRESIDENT: You think so?
HALDEMAN: I think so, yeah.
**********
PRESIDENT: Still (unintelligible) moves
(unintelligible)very close election
(unintelligible) he keeps saying if he moves
a little-
HALDEMAN: They're all... that's the whole thing. The
Washington Post said it in it's lead
editorial today. Another "McGovern's got to
change his position," and that that would be
a good thing, that's constructive. Ah, the
white wash for change.
PRESIDENT: Post prints the news so they'll say that is
perfectly all right.
HALDEMAN: Cause then they are saying...on the other
hand... that maybe we're not so smart. We
have to admire the progress he's made on the
basis of the position he's taken and maybe
he's right and we're wrong.
PRESIDENT: To be very (unintelligible) (laughs).
HALDEMAN: Sitting in Miami played into our hand a
little bit.
PRESIDENT: No.
HALDEMAN: They, ah eliminated their law prohibiting
male homosexuals from wearing female
clothing, now the boys can all put on their
dresses... so the gay lib is going to turn
out 6,000 fags to (laughs). I hope they
(unintelligible) them.
PRESIDENT: How did they(unintelligible)
