US Senate Panel Hears About Camp Lejeune Water

A U.S. Senate committee has heard testimony about the Marine Corps' attempt to delete information from a government report on contaminated drinking water at Camp Lejeune.

Isaac-Davy Aronson: The Marine Corps has asked a government health agency to black out the location of water systems in a report on the contamination. It says the information would jeopardize the security of critical infrastructure. But in testimony yesterday, retired Marine Sergeant Jerry Ensminger said it's just more of the needless secrecy he's been battling for years. Ensminger told Judiciary Committee chairman Patrick Leahy about a conversation with Congressional staffers headed to a meeting with Marine Corps officials.

Jerry Ensminger: I jokingly asked them before they went into the meeting to please ask them if they'd perfected their Klingon-type cloaking device to cloak these hundred-and-some-foot-tall towers.

Senator Patrick Leahy: See when you drive by on the road.

Jerry Ensminger: Yes, sir. And they're painted red and white checkered.

Ensminger's 9-year-old daughter died of leukemia in 1985. He blames exposure to contaminated water at Camp Lejeune. The Marine Corps says the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry had access to all information to prepare its report.