March 23, 2007
Snow To Have Surgery For Growth
White House spokesman Tony Snow said today he is going to have a small growth in his lower abdomen removed next week, but warned reporters not to overreact, saying that the growth was not cancerous and he was having the procedure done "out of an aggressive sense of caution." Snow is a colon cancer survivor.
"Please do not leap to conclusions about this because we don't know what this is," Snow told reporters as he closed the daily White House press briefing, Reuters reported. "We know it's coming out and I know I'll be back soon."
Snow is having the growth removed on Monday and expects to be away from work for up to a month, he said. Known for having warmed over the press, which did not enjoy good relations with President Bush's previous two press secretaries, Ari Fleischer and Scott McClellan, Snow's exchanges in the daily briefings have grown testy as of late, thanks in large part to the attorney firings investigation and the I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby trial.
Deputy press secretary Dana Perino is expected to take over in Snow's absence.
