WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush reversed course Wednesday and said a commission reviewing the Sept. 11 attacks should get the extra time that 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 to complete its work.
Victims' relatives and some lawmakers want an even longer extension, to January 2005. They say that would reduce the chance that 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.
``The president is pleased to support the commission's request, and we urge Congress to act quickly to extend the timetable for an additional 60 days for the commission to complete its work,'' he said.
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 any extension, saying the public deserved to get the information as soon as possible. Privately, White House aides feared that 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.
It was the second time this week that Bush changed his mind about an independent commission. Earlier, he bowed to pressure and said he would form an independent panel to look into intelligence-gathering missteps before and after the start of the war in Iraq.
The Iraq intelligence commission will not produce its report until after the election. Democratic presidential candidates have accused Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney of manipulating prewar intelligence to make the case for invading Iraq.
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.
Commission members have complained that their work repeatedly has been delayed because of disputes with the administration over access to documents and witnesses.
The commission is considering whether to subpoena notes it took on classified presidential briefing papers, including an August 2001 memorandum that discusses the possibility of airline hijackings by al-Qaida terrorists. A four-member commission team reviewed the material in December but was not allowed to take their notes with them.
The full panel will meet privately with National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice for several hours on Saturday. She will become the top administration official to go before the commission.
Relatives of the victims said they would continue to push for a January deadline.
``I don't think an additional month or two months is really going to provide the time that's necessary,'' said Mary Fetchet of New Canaan, Conn., a member of the commission's family steering committee. Her son, Brad, was killed in the attacks.
But former New Jersey Gov. Thomas Kean, a Republican who chairs the commission, said he doesn't believe a January deadline is necessary.
``We'll finish a report long before that,'' he said. ``God forbid there will be another incident. I always felt when the report is finished, it should be out. Politics cannot get involved.''
