NATION
Wednesday, June 29, 2016
East Oregonian
Page 7A
Final Benghazi report: No ‘smoking gun’ pointing to Clinton
WASHINGTON (AP) — House
Republicans on Tuesday concluded
their $7 million, two-year investiga-
tion into the deadly attacks in Beng-
hazi, Libya, with fresh accusations
of lethal mistakes by the Obama
administration but no “smoking gun”
pointing to wrongdoing by Hillary
Clinton, then secretary of state and
now the Democrats’ presumptive
presidential nominee.
After the long investigation,
illed with partisan sniping by
panel members, none of the new
revelations highlighted by the
House Benghazi committee in its
800-page report pointed speciically
to Clinton’s actions before, during or
after the Sept. 11, 2012, attacks on
the U.S. diplomatic outpost and CIA
annex in the eastern Libyan city.
Four Americans, including U.S.
Ambassador Chris Stevens, died
in the attacks. Allegations against
Clinton were a main impetus behind
the House Republicans’ creation
of the politically charged, Water-
gate-style select committee. Clinton
testiied before the panel for nearly
11 hours last fall.
While the panel’s GOP members
took shots at Clinton on Tuesday,
Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., the
chairman, summed up the document
by asking “the American people to
read this report for themselves, look
at the evidence we have collected
and reach their own conclusions.”
In Denver, Clinton dismissed the
report as an echo of previous probes
with no new discoveries. “I think it’s
pretty clear it’s time to move on,” she
said during a campaign stop.
Hardly — especially in the heat of
an election. Republican rival Donald
Trump, although silent on the subject
Tuesday, has frequently lashed out at
Clinton over Benghazi.
Nearly four years ago, the Libya
attacks became immediate political
fodder, given their timing in the
weeks before President Barack
Obama’s re-election, and that has
not abated despite seven previous
congressional investigations. There
has been inger-pointing on both
sides over security at the U.S.
diplomatic outpost in Benghazi
and whether Clinton and the White
House initially tried to portray the
assault as a protest over an offensive,
anti-Muslim video, instead of a
calculated terrorist attack.
Republican insistence that the
investigation was not politically
motivated was undermined last year
when House Majority Leader Kevin
McCarthy, R-Calif., suggested that
the committee could take credit
for Clinton’s then-slumping poll
numbers.
His statements helped dash his
chances of becoming House Speaker.
The committee interviewed more
than 100 witnesses and reviewed
some 75,000 pages of documents,
but an almost accidental discovery
by the panel last year has shadowed
Clinton’s candidacy. The committee
disclosed that she had used a private
email server to conduct government
business while serving as secretary
of state, a practice that has drawn
widespread scrutiny, including an
FBI investigation.
Already bitterly partisan, Tues-
day’s release of the report exposed
divisions within Republican ranks.
Reps. Mike Pompeo of Kansas
and Jim Jordan of Ohio issued a
separate report slamming Clinton
and the Obama administration, with
Pompeo telling reporters that the
former irst lady and senator was
“morally reprehensible.” Clinton’s
public comments casting the attack
as a possible protest over the anti-
Muslim video differed sharply
from her private assessments to
her daughter, Chelsea, and foreign
diplomats, Jordan and Pompeo said.
Gowdy, however, delected ques-
tions about her, saying the report “is
not about one person.”
The GOP report severely
criticizes the military, CIA and
administration oficials for their
response as the attacks unfolded, and
their subsequent explanations to the
American people.
On the night of Sept. 11, a
large group of men rushed into the
diplomatic compound in Benghazi,
iring guns and setting ires. Visiting
Ambassador Stevens and computer
specialist Sean Smith were killed
despite taking cover in a safe room.
Hours later, before dawn, mortar
ire hit the CIA roof nearby, killing
security contractors Tyrone Woods
and Glen Doherty.
The report found that Libyan
military oficers loyal to former
leader Moammar Gadhai, whom
the U.S. had helped depose, had
taken part in rescuing the remaining
Americans.
“Not a single wheel of a single
U.S. military asset had even turned
toward Libya,” Gowdy complained.
U.S. military leaders told the
committee they thought an evacu-
ation was imminent, slowing any
response.
The committee’s ive Democrats
denounced the Republicans’ report
as “a conspiracy theory on steroids
— bringing back long-debunked
allegations with no credible evidence
whatsoever.”
Democrats released their own
report Monday saying that while the
State Department’s security measures
in Benghazi were “woefully inad-
equate,” Clinton never personally
turned down a request for additional
security. The military could not have
done anything differently that night
to save the lives of the Americans,
Democrats said.
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