SOLYNDRA:

Republicans demand access to more White House officials

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Tomorrow marks 100 days since the House Energy and Commerce Committee issued subpoenas to the White House over the Solyndra controversy, and to mark the occasion Republicans today unveiled a new list of executive-branch employees whom they are demanding to appear for interviews with committee investigators.

Topping that list are Heather Zichal, White House energy and climate change adviser, and Aditya Kumar, an aide to former White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel.

Emails released as part of the yearlong investigation show that during her time as a top aide to former Obama energy and environmental adviser Carol Browner, Zichal was briefed about the deteriorating financial status of Solyndra in the fall of 2010 and fretted about how it would affect the half-billion-dollar loan that the Department of Energy gave the company.

In the days before Solyndra finally filed for bankruptcy, emails show that the White House was scrambling to figure out how to handle what it knew would become a public relations nightmare.

At one point, Zichal emailed top Office of Management and Budget official Jeffrey Zients to ask him to join a conference call on the issue. When Zients asked what was going on, Zichal gave a curt response: "*#-@storm."

Energy and Commerce Republicans also want to interview a trio of top Office of Management and Budget employees: Kevin Carroll, Kelly Colyar and Fouad Saad.

OMB played a key role in signing off on the loan guarantee of more than half a billion dollars that DOE gave to Solyndra. Committee Republicans said they expect to see the OMB officials by Feb. 17, or a subpoena will be forthcoming.

Panel Republicans announced the new targets of their probe on the same day they again blasted the White House for "stonewalling" the committee for requested documents.

"Despite the 'who's who' of West Wing names involved with Solyndra, White House lawyers continue to delay and deny even the most basic information about the White House's involvement in the loan guarantee gone wrong, underscoring the disappointing reality of President Obama's broken promises on transparency," Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) said.

In their letter to White House legal counsel Kathryn Ruemmler today, Republicans said they want to have access to all requested documents by Feb. 21.

If not, "you will compel us to pursue all options available to the Committee under its rules and the rules of the United States House of Representatives to address such obstructive behavior," they wrote. "We are fully prepared to do so."

White House spokesman Eric Schultz said this afternoon that the administration is reviewing the letter.

Click here to view the committee's letter.