RICHARD HANNA CONFIRMS BENGHAZI WITCH-HUNT

A second House Republican has now conceded that the overarching purpose of the House Select Committee on Benghazi has been to attack former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

In September, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy argued that one of House Republicans’ successes has been using the Benghazi Committee to drive down Clinton’s poll numbers. Though McCarthy tried to walk back his controversial comments, Rep. Richard Hanna argued on Wednesday that the Majority Leader had it right to begin with.

“Sometimes the biggest sin you can commit in D.C. is to tell the truth,” Hanna said in an interview on Keeler in the Morning, a radio show in upstate New York. The third-term congressman paused for a moment, perhaps recognizing the importance of what he was about to say, before going on to agree with McCarthy’s original statement.

“This may not be politically correct, but I think that there was a big part of this investigation that was designed to go after people and an individual, Hillary Clinton,” Hanna said.

He explained further why he believes the Benghazi Committee’s purpose has been in part to attack Clinton. “After what Kevin McCarthy said, it’s difficult to accept at least a part of it was not,” Hanna said. “I think that’s the way Washington works. But you’d like to expect more from a committee that’s spent millions of dollars and tons of time.”


Listen to it (relevant section starts at 9:45):



For years, House Republicans had claimed the Benghazi probe was about investigating the events surrounding the 2012 attack in Libya that left four Americans dead, including U.S.

Ambassador Chris Stevens, rather than undermining Clinton’s potential presidential bid.

But after McCarthy’s Kinsley gaffe, which was among the factors that doomed his seemingly-inevitable rise to the House Speakership, and now Hanna’s admission, there is growing doubt even among GOPers about the Benghazi Committee’s true purpose.

McCarthy and Hanna aren’t the only Republicans to publicly declare that the Benghazi Committee has been on a partisan quest. Over the weekend, Maj. Bradley Podliska, a Republican investigator formerly working on the Committee, revealed that he had lost his job for refusing to solely focus his investigation on Clinton. Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC), who heads the Committee, denies the charge.

Clinton is set to testify before the Committee, which has now continued longer than the Watergate probe, on October 22nd.

[cross-posted from thinkprogress]

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BENGHAZI WITCH-HUNT COST MILLIONS

The Department of Defense has spent millions of dollars and thousands of hours trying to fulfill requests from Congress’s six investigations into Benghazi, according to a letter from the Pentagon to a top-ranking Democrat.

“The Department has devoted thousands of man-hours to responding to the numerous and often repetitive congressional requests regarding Benghazi,” Assistant Secretary of Defense for Legislative Affairs Elizabeth King said in a letter to Congress dated earlier this month. That estimate includes “time devoted to approximately 50 congressional hearings, briefings, and interviews which the Department has led or participated in.” While no total calculation has been completed yet, King estimated that total cost of compliance with Congress’ requests to the Pentagon and other agencies runs “into the millions of dollars.”

“We continue to work fervently to address outstanding items,” King continued, including document requests and additional interviews — including with people who have already submitted to previous hearings or interviews. “Since the tragic events of September 2012, we have made every effort to provide information to the various congressional committees regarding Department’s actions in response to the attacks, and have accommodated Congress’ every request regardless of expense,” King wrote in the letter, which was sent to Rep. Adam Smith, ranking member on the House Armed Services Committee. Committee chairman Rep. Howard “Buck” McKeon was also sent a copy of the letter.

Smith first contacted the Pentagon last month to “gain a better understanding of the resources exhausted” in the DOD response to the now multiyear investigation into the Obama administration’s response to the attacks in Benghazi, Libya. According to The Hill, following the Pentagon’s response, Smith reached out to McKeon to call off the witch-hunt that has to date produced no evidence of nefarious wrongdoing on the part of the White House, Pentagon, State Department, or intelligence community. “We must stop wasting this committee’s and our military’s scarce resources chasing a scandal that does not exist,” Smith wrote.

But it appears, even though the American public long ago stopped believing Republican claims of some kind of cover-up related to Benghazi, that there is no sign of the investigations to end. “It is important that the Committee see this oversight effort through to its conclusion,” McKeon spokesman Claude Chafin told the Hill. “Chairman McKeon appreciates Ranking Member Smith’s concerns as well as the support he has given to our oversight of this matter.”

That drive to press forward with the investigations only seems to rest in the Republican members of Congress — who continue to stress the issue despite issuing reports debunking many of the conspiracies they promote — and fringes of the conservative base whose support they seek. Even their aides seem to have grown weary of the pursuit of a non-existent cover-up. “There are some real issues there and then there is just some crazy stuff,” one senior House GOP aide was quoted as saying almost a year ago. (HT: The Hill)

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WITCH HUNT

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