News In Brief

Senate unit rejects choice for US information post

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee Tuesday rejected the nomination of Leslie Lenkowsky to be deputy director of the US Information Agency (USIA) in an 11-to-6 vote. Mr. Lenkowsky is now acting deputy director of the agency.

Chairman Charles H. Percy (R) of Illinois said he concluded Lenkowsky had been ''an active participant'' in blacklisting liberals to keep them out of USIA speakers' programs abroad.

Lenkowsky, in testimony before the panel, denied a part in the blacklisting, but he was contradicted by several present and former USIA employees.

''What emerges from the hearing record is that the USIA has been the object of intense politicization,'' said Sen. Charles McC. Mathias (R) of Maryland.