Lawmakers Call For Justice Dept Inquiry Into Passport File Breaches

Bipartisan support is mounting for the Justice Department to investigate the unauthorized searches by a State Department employee and three contracted workers of all three presidential candidate's passport files in recent months.

The calls by lawmakers in both parties come as the State Department's inspector general is conducting its own probe of the security breaches, which trace from last summer through this month. But lawmakers are demanding the Justice Department's involvement on the grounds that federal laws may have been broken.

"That kind of a breach of privacy is just despicable," Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter, the top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said Sunday on CNN's Late Edition. "I think that ought to be a very intense investigation."

Specter said the Senate Judiciary Committee may hold its own hearings on the security breach.

On Friday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called all three leading presidential candidates and apologized for the unauthorized searches. Her aides said they believed that those involved were driven by "imprudent curiosity" rather than politics. But they also said the State Department's inspector general would investigate. They also said the Justice Department could become involved if it is found that federal laws may have been broken.

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