U of I officials debated document request

CHICAGO, Sept. 9 (UPI) -- Illinois university officials debated whether to release documents of a charity connected to Democratic U.S. presidential nominee Barack Obama, records show.

The University of Illinois at Chicago is the holder of the archives of the educational charity Chicago Annenberg Challenge. E-mail documents show school officials discussed with the charity's former executive director whether or not to release certain records to a conservative magazine attempting to link the Illinois U.S. senator to 1960s radical William Ayers, the Chicago Tribune reported Tuesday.

Obama is Chicago Annenberg Challenge's one-time board president and Ayers, now a IUC professor, was among its founders.

The newspaper said that rather than immediately turn the requested documents over to National Review magazine reporter Stanley Kurtz, e-mails showed that University of Illinois President B. Joseph White and other officials consulted with former charity executive director Kenneth Rolling, who reportedly insisted that some files be kept closed.

All the documents were ultimately given to Kurtz, a university attorney told the newspaper.