July 14, 1973 – NBC Nightly News – Gordon Skene Sound Collection –
July 14, 1973 – News about Watergate took centerstage this day. Deputy Director of CREEP (Committee To Re-Elect The President) pointed fingers and named names. The biggest name was Attorney General John Mitchell, whom he claimed knew about the Dirty Tricks, the coverup and had approved the plan to bug the DNC Headquarters at The Watergate.
Initially claiming Nixon knew nothing about the plans or the Watergate break-in, Magruder had a change of heart and started to cooperate with Federal Prosecutors, and his testimony on this day implicated both Mitchell and H.R. Haldeman. Every day, it was getting worse and worse for the White House. Magruder was the Number Two man at CREEP and an assistant to Haldeman at the White House. He began his testimony with an incredible million dollar plan for Political dirty tricks and law breaking; a plan proposed to John Mitchell, then-Attorney General by G. Gordon Liddy who was then at CREEP. The President’s counsel John Dean was also at the meeting. The story told of proposed abductions of officials and particularly members of radical groups who were planning on demonstrating at the Republican Convention. Magruder said everyone was appalled by the plan because of its $1 million cost and was told to go back to the drawing board. Eventually Liddy brought the amount down to a quarter million and Attorney General Mitchell, who by then became Nixon’s Campaign Manager approved the plan. And so Liddy’s burglars broke into the DNC Headquarters at The Watergate and did not get caught. Summaries of bugged telephone calls and photographed documents began flowing into John Mitchell’s office, according to Magruder. There was only one flaw, Magruder pointed out; Mitchell thought the stuff was worthless.
And that’s a little of how it went on this July 14, 1973 as presented by NBC Nightly News.