Bush changes mind, favors giving 9/11 panel more time

WASHINGTON - President Bush reversed course Wednesday and said a commission reviewing the Sept. 11 attacks should get the extra time members say they need to do a thorough job.

Congress gave the bipartisan commission until May 27 to release its final report. But after a two-day hearing last week highlighting a series of government missteps that allowed many of the 19 hijackers to elude detection, the commission said it needed until July 26.

Victims' relatives and some lawmakers want an extension to January 2005, saying it would reduce the chance the report would be influenced by the November presidential election.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan said the commission's request that Congress approve two extra months is long enough.

But he added, "If the commission has information that can help prevent another catastrophic terrorist attack on America soil, we need to have that information as soon as possible."

Bush and Republican leaders in Congress had opposed an extension, saying the public deserved to get the information as soon as possible. Privately, White House aides feared delaying the commission's final report would result in a potentially damaging assessment, during the White House campaign, of the Bush administration's handling of pre-attack intelligence.

The Sept. 11 panel - known formally as the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States - was established by Congress to study the nation's preparedness before the 2001 attacks and its response afterward, and to make recommendations for guarding against similar disasters.

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