![]() ![]() Liddy, after a phone consultation about the arrests with CRP Deputy Director Jeb Magruder (who had managed CRP up until March of that year, and had the most direct organizational authority over Liddy's activities), personally approached Kleindienst the same day at the Burning Tree Club golf club in Bethesda, Maryland. Later in the morning Kleindienst was officially notified of the arrests. Before dawn on Saturday, June 17, 1973, five days after Kleindienst was sworn in, James McCord and four other burglars operating on Liddy's instructions were arrested at the Watergate complex. Unknown to Kleindienst, leaders of the Committee to Re-Elect the President (CRP) had tasked Gordon Liddy with arranging various covert operations, one of which was to be a burglary of the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate complex in Washington, DC. After having served as Acting Attorney General for a little under three and a half months, his appointment was approved by the Senate on June 12 after an attempt to block the nomination by Ted Kennedy on the grounds of his involvement with ITT failed. On February 15, 1972, Attorney General Mitchell resigned effective March 1 in order to work on the Nixon re-election campaign, with President Nixon nominating Kleindienst to serve as his successor. But in his official role as Deputy Attorney General, he also repeatedly told Congress that no one had interfered with his department's handling of the case, failing to mention either Nixon or Ehrlichman. Nixon and his aide John Ehrlichman told him to drop the case, which created an impression that they were violating their ethical obligations in favor of ITT, and that, as an attorney himself, Kleindienst was now obligated to report these ethical lapses to the state bars in the jurisdictions involved. This gave him responsibilities relating to the government's suit against the International Telephone & Telegraph Corporation. ![]() Kleindienst suspended his private practice in 1969 to accept the post of Deputy Attorney General offered him by President Nixon. Mitchell agreed to serve as United States Attorney General on the condition that Kleindienst serve as Deputy Attorney General. Nixon administration Kleindienst in a group photo of Nixon's cabinet on June 16, 1972, fourth from the right in the back row.Īfter Richard Nixon won the 1968 presidential election, John N. Goldwater rejected this change, but did agree to Kleindienst and White sharing the role. Clifton White, an experienced GOP operative, would be a better choice. Kleindienst had never worked on a national campaign. Goldwater stipulated that he would only respond to the "draft Goldwater" movement if the campaign were led by three Republicans close to him: Kleindienst, Denison Kitchel as Campaign Manager, and Dean Burch as Assistant Campaign Manager. On January 3, 1964, Barry Goldwater asked his friend Kleindienst to serve as Director of Operations in his presidential campaign. ![]()
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