WHITEWATER . . . TREASURY OFFICIALS DENY WRONGDOING

Deputy Treasury Secretary Roger Altman told a Senate Banking panel that he had committed no legal or ethical violations during contacts with the White House over the Whitewater affair. He nonetheless apologized for potentially misleading testimony given at an earlier hearing. During intense grilling by committee members, Altman pointed out that three independent investigations had discovered no interference by Clinton Administration officials in the case of the failed Madison Guaranty Savings & Loan. Earlier in the day, Treasury Secretary Lloyd Bentsen's chief of staff, Joshua Steiner, tried to dismiss the accuracy of entries in his diary, in which he had written that Altman had "gracefully ducked" a question about Whitewater-related meetings.