The Nixon Presidential Library said it will make the records accessible online. Nixon: 18 1/2-minute gap an accident

Richard Nixon’s secret grand jury testimony about the Watergate scandal was unsealed Thursday and the former president shed no light on the infamous 18 1/2-minute gap in the White House tapes.

Nixon told grand jurors that he believed it was simply an accident that some of the tape got erased.


“I practically blew my stack,” Nixon testified when he found out how much of the tape had been wiped out, the Associated Press reported.

The National Archives and Nixon’s Presidential Library made the grand jury records public four months after a judge ordered they be made available, according to the AP. The testimony has been posted online and thousands of other documents and sound recordings are available to the public, the wire service said.

The grand jury testimony was made during 11 hours of under-oath questioning over two days in June 1975, after Nixon’s August 1974 resignation over the Watergate scandal.

The 18 1/2-minute gap was in a White House tape recording between the president and his chief of staff three days after the break-in at Democratic Party offices at the Watergate. It was considered crucial in determining the president’s role in covering up the Watergate scandal, the AP said.

Grand jury testimonies generally remain sealed and private. While the Obama administration argued that too many people mentioned in the testimony were still alive, the secret testimony was ordered to be released after a judge determined that its historical value trumped any privacy concerns.

“Watergate significance in American history cannot be overstated,” wrote U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth in his decision, the AP said. “The disclosure of President Nixon’s grand jury testimony would likely enhance the existing historical record, foster scholarly discussion and improve the public’s understanding of a significant historical event.”

The request to unseal the testimony was made by historian Stanley Kutler, who has written several books about Nixon and Watergate.

But even Kutler thought that the grand jury testimony would not be ground-breaking.

“The grand jury after that testimony had a chance to sit and indict but they did not…so I don’t expect it to be that important,” he said to the AP, while adding that it was another victory for transparency in public life.

The National Archives also released a number of other records, such as audio of Nixon talking about paying a late-night visit to the Lincoln Memorial to meet with anti-Vietnam War protesters in 1970. In the audio, the AP wrote, Nixon recalled telling the protesters that stopping the war and pollution will not end “the spiritual hunger which all of us have.” He went on to say that is the “great mystery of life from the beginning of time.”

Nixon, the 37th president of the United States, passed away in 1994.