An update from a post a couple of weeks ago:
Culture of corruption: Obama's auto bailout chief Ron 'I did this all for the unions' Bloom caught lying to Congress.
The House asked Bloom outright that very question, and Bloom denied it outright:
Rep. Dan Burton (R-IN) questions Mr. Ron Bloom, former Senior Advisor to the Secretary of the Treasury, on whether Mr. Bloom had said at a farewell dinner of the Auto Task Force in late July 2009, "I did this all for the unions." Mr. Bloom denied the quote...
However, several independent sources printed the exact thing he said - "I did this all for the unions." With that, the update via
Instapundit:
From the article:
Ron Bloom, the top White House auto bailout official who has flatly denied accusations that he once said his work on the bailouts was "all for the unions," now admits that he might, in fact, have said those words. Just a few weeks ago, in sworn testimony before the House Committee on Government Oversight and Reform, Bloom said denied four times that he said "I did this all for the unions" at a July 2009 party attended by most of the bailout team. But in a new letter to committee chairman Rep. Darrell Issa, Bloom writes that he does not recall making the comment, but "given the amount of time that has passed since the dinner in July 2009 and the fact that others may have a different recollection, I cannot say with absolute certainty that I did not make the alleged comment."
...Seeking clarification, on July 6 Issa wrote a letter to Bloom, giving him "an opportunity to clarify" his testimony to the committee. "Despite your five denials, two independent sources documented you saying these words," Issa wrote. "It appears that either a respected reporter and your former boss in the Obama administration have both given inaccurate accounts of your comments to the public, or your testimony was not completely truthful. Therefore, if you would like to amend or clarify your testimony for the record, we encourage you to do so as soon as possible."
And now, in response, Bloom has sent a letter to Issa:
You asked if I would like to clarify my testimony about whether I made a certain statement at a dinner two years earlier in July 2009. After reviewing your letter and with the benefit of the transcript passage that you quote, I have reviewed carefully the questions asked and my responses, as well as my best recollection of the event in question. I do not recall making the alleged comment that was the subject of Congressman Burton's inquiry. Nonetheless, given the amount of time that has passed since the dinner in July 2009 and the fact that others may have a different recollection, I cannot say with absolute certainty that I did not make the alleged comment. In light of that uncertainty and in order to make sure the hearing record is as precise as possible, I would ask that this letter be made part of the official record so that my testimony will reflect that I do not recall making the alleged comment.
Bloom concluded by praising the work of the bailout team and telling Issa, "I can assure you that the comment attributed to me is not reflective of my view."
That last part will go down as a political class classic. My response to it:
WHAT???