Benghazi panel blows its cool
It took 10 months but the House panel investigating the 2012 attacks in Benghazi got contentious on Tuesday. Little new information came from the two-hour-plus hearing, but members traded barbs over the scope and progress of the committeeâs investigation. And each side accused the other of politicizing the terrorist attacks in Libya that left four Americans dead. Story Continued Below Democrats lambasted committee Chairman Trey Gowdy, accusing the South Carolina Republican of locking them out of interviews with witnesses. In return, Republicans questioned whether the five minority members were taking the investigation seriously, noting that Democrats have not requested interviews with State Department or CIA witnesses. The discord is unusual for the select committee. Gowdy and Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings, the panelâs top Democrat, have enjoyed a cordial relationship since the committee was created in May and often meet off the House floor to discuss the investigation. But that tone changed Tuesday. âWeâre going to take this charge seriously, and I hope the minority will participate as well,â said Kansas Republican Rep. Mike Pompeo. He added that Democrats âact as if their job is to play defense, to stop us â¦ not to participate.â Cummings contended that Democrats have tried to work with Gowdy to establish new rules for the committee but have been shut out. âWe can no longer remain silent,â Cummings said, adding that many had worried that the panel would become a ârepeatâ of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, âwhere ridiculous allegations were made with no evidence, no evidence to back them up. We just want some rules.â Ostensibly, the hearing was supposed to focus on outstanding document requests, with testimony from Neal Higgins, the CIAâs director of congressional affairs, and Joel Rubin, deputy assistant secretary of state for legislative affairs. Both Higgins and Rubin pledged to respond speedily to the panelâs requests. Before the hearing, Cummings released three letters complaining about Gowdyâs handling of the committee, including a December letter signed by all five of the panelâs Democrats. The lawmakers said Republicans have interviewed at least five witnesses without a Democrat in attendance, including Ray Maxwell, a former State Department deputy who alleged he was told to scrub documents related to the attacks. âYou have had different standards for Republicans and Democrats participating in this investigation, secret meetings with witnesses, and â perhaps most importantly â withheld or downplayed information when it undermines the allegations we are investigating,â Cummings wrote. Gowdyâs office dismissed the Democratsâ concerns in a statement late Monday as an attempt to politicize the investigation. âChairman Gowdy will talk to Benghazi sources with or without the Democrats present just as they are welcome to talk to sources with or without Republicans present,â said Jamal Ware, communications director of the Select Committee on Benghazi. âNo congressional select committee has ever had a requirement that sources meet with both sides at the same time, and the Benghazi Committee is no exception.â Gowdy stressed Tuesday that the committee has âhad some success,â saying it received 15,000 pages of documents from the State Department that had never before been released to Congress. The department also turned over 25,000 pages that had previously been provided to the Oversight Committee, âbut now with fewer redactions,â he said. And Republicans seized on statements from Democrats about the need for another committee to investigate Benghazi. Congress and the administration have completed nearly a dozen other probes into the 2012 attacks, and the House panel was designed to be a clearinghouse to collect and analyze information from the earlier probes. âTo suggest that the chairman has been unfair is ridiculous,â Ohio Republican Rep. Jim Jordan said. âWeâve got to to pick up the pace and get to the truth.â When he was tapped to lead the probe, Gowdy repeatedly stressed that the bulk of the committeeâs work would be done privately, as he questioned the effectiveness of public hearings on controversial topics. Cummings first wrote to Gowdy in November, with another letter sent earlier this month, but the private correspondence between the two lawmakers was first released Monday. In the letters, Cummings accuses Gowdyâs staff of barring Democrats from key interviews with witnesses and deemphasizing information that disproved some of the lingering conspiracy theories on Benghazi, including the allegation that the State Department purposefully destroyed documents to protect then-Secretary Hillary Clinton. Maxwell, according to Cummingsâ letters, repeated the claims about State Department documents during interviews with Republican staff and offered up a second witness to corroborate his allegation. But that unnamed witness rebutted Maxwellâs story, Cummings wrote. Democrats were left out of both interviews, despite willingness by Maxwell and the second source to be interviewed by representatives from both parties, according to Cummings. âIn some of our conversations in the past, you have suggested that whistleblowers might be willing to come forward to provide information only to you. That was simply not the case here,â Cummings wrote. âWhen my staff spoke with Mr. Maxwell and the additional witness he identified, both were willing to talk to Democrats, but your staff excluded them nonetheless.â The criticism is notable as Gowdy and Cummings have worked hard to be respectful of one another in public. Cummings gave Gowdy high praise late last year for running a thorough investigation, and Gowdy even help persuade Democrats to participate in the committee after taking the Maryland Democrat to dinner shortly after the committee was first announced. But that relationship has soured, with Democrats accusing Republicans of rejecting subpoena rules that would allow for a public vote if disagreements arise. âWe have spent months trying to resolve these problems privately, but theyâve exhausted our patience and we can no longer remain silent,â said California Rep. Linda SÃ¡nchez. âThis isnât the fact-based or fair investigation that Gowdy promised it would be and that the American people deserve.â Democrats are also complaining that the investigation has devolved into a partisan fight reminiscent of the way Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) probed the terrorist attacks when he chaired the House Oversight Committee â an assertion Republican Rep. Peter Roskam rejected. âThe straw man argument says this is the Oversight and Government Reform Committee,â Roskam said. âNo, it is not. Itâs a completely different committee â¦ with a completely different chairman.â The committeeâs five Democrats complained that despite a multimillion-dollar budget, the panel is moving slowly, with only a handful of public hearings. Staff for Gowdy said earlier this month that the committee has met with officials from the State and Justice departments on embassy security and document production.