White House press secretary Robert Gibbs refused to say if President Barack Obama would sign an executive order to prevent the release of detainee abuse photos Tuesday. Earlier in the day, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer told reporters that he had reason to believe Mr. Obama was considering such an order.

"I have reason to believe they are looking at that as a way to resolve this situation," Hoyer (D-Md.) said.

At Tuesday's White House briefing, spokesman Gibbs said, "All I'm going to say on this is that the president has committed to all interested parties that he intends to do what is necessary to keep those photos from being released and that he intends to keep that commitment."

The White House correspondent pressed for more: "Did he give Hoyer a reason to believe?"

"I won't get into any private conversations," Gibbs responded.

On Friday, Republican Senator Lindsey Grahamcalled for "a commitment from the White House that President Obama would issue an executive order classifying the photos as secret should that be needed to keep them under wraps," the New York Times reported.

"The sooner we do this, the better," Mr. Graham said.

The Times story added, "In order to ease Democratic concerns, the president on Thursday sent Congress a letter saying he would take 'every legal and administrative remedy'' to keep the photos sealed. Mr. Graham, who has warned that release of the photos could incite anti-American attacks overseas, said he just wanted the president to go a little further and make an explicit promise of an executive order."

This video is from C-SPAN, broadcast June 16, 2009.