https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2015/10/05/dems-up-the-ante-in-benghazi-panel-fight/
Democrats are taking the unprecedented step of releasing excerpts from a closed-session interview the House Benghazi committee conducted last month with Hillary Clinton aide Cheryl Mills, accusing the panel’s Republican Chairman Trey Gowdy (S.C.) of selectively leaking information to damage Clinton in the presidential race.
In a letter sent Monday morning, Democrats on the panel released statements made by Mills from the Sept. 3 interview that paint Clinton in a favorable light. The letter charges Gowdy with failing to provide a fair account of Mills’s interview, alleging that he orchestrated small press leaks designed to produce negative stories about the Democratic presidential front-runner.
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“It has become obvious that the only way to adequately correct the public record is to release the complete transcript of the Committee’s interview with Ms. Mills,” the Democrats wrote, adding, “since you have indicated your unwillingness to do this in a bipartisan manner, we plan to do so ourselves.”
A spokesman for Gowdy responded by denouncing Democrats for their own selective leak.
“Democrats have shown their nakedly political motivation, willingness to violate the letter and spirit of House Rules, and their desire to defend Secretary Clinton without regard for the integrity of the investigation,” Jamal Ware said in a statement.
“The committee has not released transcripts from witness interviews for myriad reasons, including the need to hear from all witnesses and gather all facts before drawing inferences … Most Democrats on the Benghazi Committee have endorsed Clinton and they are now running a protection effort for the former Secretary.”
The interview excerpts released by Democrats push back on Republican claims that Clinton was detached on the night of the 2012 attacks and during their aftermath.
Mills, according to the excerpts, described Clinton as hands-on and in favor of deploying military resources to “secure our people,” saying that “absolutely everything was on the table” in order to stabilize the situation in Benghazi.
“She was pretty emphatic about wanting whatever to be done and whatever were assets that could be deployed, if that was both effective and possible to be done,” Mills told lawmakers, according to the excerpts.
“Obviously, it was a challenging environment, given that our compound had been overrun,” Mills said. “And so you want to ensure that, as you also are thinking about who else might go in, how they are able to do that effectively. But my observation and impression and, obviously, engagements were around what can be done, what can be sent, and how can that be done best. There was not any notion of not doing that to the fullest amount that was practical, effective, and possible.”
Democrats said they will give Gowdy five days to respond to their letter before they publish the full transcript of the interview.
“We have held off on taking such action for more than a year, but we will no longer sit and watch selective, out-of-context leaks continue to mischaracterize the testimony the Select Committee has received,” the Democrats wrote.
In one instance, Democrats accused Republicans of leaking information to Politico following Mills’s interview that they said raised false questions about the independence of a Benghazi report by the State Department’s Accountability Review Board. GOP sources suggested to the news outlet that Mills had “reviewed and made suggestions for changes” to the report.
“In fact, this claim was already known—and had been debunked—two years earlier during the investigation led by former Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa,” Democrats wrote on Monday.
Democrats’ letter continues a long-running feud between Gowdy and Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), the Benghazi panel’s top Democrat, who has continuously accused the chairman of using the investigation as a political tool.
It also comes less than a week after House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) suggested the panel’s work was political in nature, remarks that seemed to confirm Democrats’ view of the probe.
“Everybody thought Hillary Clinton was unbeatable, right? But we put together a Benghazi special committee, a select committee, what are her numbers today?” McCarthy told Fox News on Tuesday. “Her numbers are dropping, why? Because she’s untrustable [sic]. But no one would have known any of that had happened.”
The comments created a firestorm on the left, drawing criticism from Clinton’s campaign and Democratic lawmakers from both chambers.
“When I hear a statement like that, which demonstrates unequivocally that this was always meant to be a partisan political exercise, I feel like it does a grave disservice and dishonors not just the memory of the four that we lost but of everybody who has served our country,” she said in an interview with MSNBC’s Al Sharpton on Wednesday.
McCarthy, who is expected to become the next speaker, has since walked back the comments, saying the panel was formed to investigate the incident and he did not mean to suggest it has political motivations. But his gaffe has drawn criticism from some Republicans, who have openly questioned if he has the communication skills to be speaker.
During her interview with the panel, Mills said she told Clinton that agency representatives were going to discuss the situation on a staff-only video teleconference, only to hear that Clinton wanted to participate.
“When we said it was going to be a staff SVTCS [Secure Video Teleconference], which was our diplomatic way of saying that maybe she shouldn’t be attending, she said, ‘I’m coming,'” Mills said. “And so we tried to make sure the rest of the interagency knew ahead of time that she was going to be on, but we were unsuccessful, so they were surprised when she sat down.”
Clinton was “devastated” by the loss of life in Benghazi, according to Mills.
“Ambassador Stevens was someone she had a lot of confidence and respect for. And his guidance and his way was a compelling one. And the notion that he had been murdered, I think, was something that all of us thought was unbearable, but I think she particularly felt the pain of that,” Mills said.
“In the days afterwards, she spent time reaching out to our team in Tripoli, constantly trying to determine if they had what they needed, constantly trying to remind people that, while we all have jobs, people are fragile and you have to remember the fragility of people and their humanity and you have to give respect to that.”
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