Investigation and news reporting of the CIA leak continue to heat up in September.
September 26-29, 2003:

 
Sept. 26, 2003 – The Counterespionage section of the Department of Justice decides to pursue a criminal investigation into the CIA leak.

Same day -- NBC News reporter Andrea Mitchell and MSNBC's Alex Johnson break the story that “The CIA has asked the Justice Department to investigate allegations that the White House broke federal laws by revealing the identity of one of its undercover employees in retaliation against the woman's husband, a former ambassador who publicly criticized President Bush's since-discredited claim that Iraq had sought weapons-grade uranium from Africa.”

Sept. 28, 2003 – A Washington Post article quotes an unnamed administration source as saying that two officials got in touch with at least six media outlets about Mrs. Wilson and should not have done so.

Sept. 29, 2003 – The Department of Justice requests the FBI to investigate the leak of Valerie Plame Wilson’s name.

Same day – DOJ notifies CIA that Counterespionage has also requested an investigation.

Same day – At the White House press briefing, Press Secretary Scott McClellan has to evade aggressive questioning on the CIA leak:

“Q Scott, has anyone -- has the president tried to find who outed the CIA agent? And has he fired anyone in the White House, yet?     

MR. MCCLELLAN: Well, Helen, that's assuming a lot of things. First of all, that is not the way this White House operates. The president expects everyone in his administration to adhere to the highest standards of conduct. No one would be authorized to do such a thing.         

Secondly, there -- I've seen the anonymous media reports. If I could find out who anonymous was, it would make my life a whole easier. But --

Q Does he think it didn't come from here?

MR. MCCLELLAN: But we've made it very clear that anyone, anyone who has information relating to this should report that information to the Department of Justice.

Q Does he doubt it came from the White House?

MR. MCCLELLAN: I'm sorry?

Q Does he doubt?

MR. MCCLELLAN: Well, there has been no information that has been brought to our attention, beyond what we've seen in the media reports, to suggest White House involvement.

Bill?

Q Will the president move aggressively to see if such transgression has occurred in the White House? Will he ask top White House officials to sign statements saying that they did not give the information?

MR. MCCLELLAN: Bill, if someone leaked classified information of this nature, the appropriate agency to look into it would be the Department of Justice. So, the Department of Justice is the one that would look into matters like this.

Q So you're saying the White House won't take a proactive approach?

MR. MCCLELLAN: Do you have any specific information to bring to my attention suggesting White House involvement? I haven't seen any.

Q So do you mean the president would not want to know whether someone had leaked information of this kind?

MR. MCCLELLAN: The president -- the president has been -- I spoke for him earlier today. The president believes leaking classified information is a very serious matter --

Q So why won't ---

MR. MCCLELLAN: -- and it should be pursued to the fullest extent --

Q Right. So why won't --

MR. MCCLELLAN: -- by the appropriate agency, and the appropriate agency is the Department of Justice.

Q Why wouldn't he proactively do that; ask people on the staff to say that they had not leaked it?”

Same day – Conservative columnist Robert Novak’s name is much in the news on this day, as all the networks discuss investigations underway into the question of whether the White House deliberately leaked the name of a CIA operative. Joseph Wilson appears in interviews, including on NPR:
 

“Ambassador JOSEPH WILSON: Well, when I first spoke to Bob Novak about this, he called me for a confirmation, which I declined to provide, but in asking the question, he said that CIA officers had told him my wife's name. After he printed his article, which referred to two senior administration officials, I called him back to ask for a clarification, whether it was CIA or senior administration, and he told me he misspoke the first time. So that takes it basically out of the CIA and puts it somewhere else in the government, as best as I can figure, the etiquette of these sorts of sourcing decisions. Subsequent to that, in the week following the Novak article, I received calls from journalists who, quoting White House sources, asked me for comments. So the White House was certainly pushing the story for a full week after the Novak article came out.

CHADWICK: Why do you think the White House would do that?

Amb. WILSON: Well, I've always operated on the assumption that it was to intimidate and prevent others from coming forward and speaking. As you recall, at the time, there were a number of analysts who had been speaking off the record or on background or not for attribution complaining that there had been undue pressure placed on them by repeated visits by the vice president, his chief of staff and Mr. Gingrich out to the CIA. Now in The Washington Post yesterday and today a source is quoted as saying that it was pure spite and revenge because I'd written my article saying there was nothing to this uranium sales story. If that's the case, I find it reprehensible that a public servant who's paid by the US taxpayer is wasting America's time seeking revenge on somebody who told a story that just happened to be true.”

 
The outing might be pure revenge, as speculated. If so, however, it seems somewhat misdirected. The person ultimately harmed most is not Joseph Wilson—who not only authored the New York Times column but had also strongly hinted his viewpoint in television interviews much earlier in 2003—but his wife, and along with her arguably the entire Counter-Proliferation Division at CIA. Thus the aim might be to stymie the unit that could stymie a wider war in the Middle East, since the administration still at this point clearly harbors designs against both Syria and Iran.