WASHINGTON?Four top Democratic senators Wednesday gave their full support to a General Accounting Office inquiry into meetings between the Bush White House and industry leaders on Bush’s energy policy.

The senators, including Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut and Carl Levin of Michigan, are spearheading the Senate probe of energy trading company Enron. They said the GAO should press its long-standing requests for White House contacts with the energy industry.

The White House renewed its objection to the request, questioning the GAO’s authority to demand the documents.

Press secretary Ari Fleischer said the White House also was protecting “the rights of Americans to come and talk to their government of people in all kinds of meetings and all variety of settings from all types of different backgrounds and have a right to have a meeting where anything they say is not turned into a news release.”