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National Security

On Benghazi attack, angry words from Obama and Republicans

By Karen DeYoung,November 14, 2012

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Some documents released by the Republican-led House Oversight and Government Reform Committee revealed requests by the top U.S. security officer in Libya for additional help. The State Department supplied two large binders of diplomatic cables and other documents to Congress ahead of this week’s hearings.

But Republicans have complained that the administration has been slow to produce requested documents on the matter and has made examination procedures unnecessarily cumbersome. Senate staffers said the documents provided contained no major revelations about security conditions ahead of the attack.

McCain, Graham and Ayotte said in a news conference Wednesday morning, and when they later introduced their resolution on the Senate floor, that scattered testimony among a number of panels is inefficient and that a select committee is the only way to get at the truth.

Both Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) and House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) indicated that they were not convinced that the individual committees cannot handle the matter.

McCain and his colleagues reserved their most incendiary words for Rice, and the Arizona Republican said they will do “whatever’s necessary to block the nomination that’s within our power.”

Obama said he had made no decisions on Cabinet changes, but senior administration officials have made no secret of the fact that Rice is the president’s top choice to replace Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state. Rice, who was among a handful of Obama supporters when he began his run for president in 2007, is in his “inner, inner circle,” one official said.

Rice, Obama said Wednesday, “has done exemplary work. She has represented the United States and our interests in the United Nations with skill, and professionalism, and toughness, and grace.”

If the senators want to talk about Benghazi, he said angrily, “I’m happy to have that discussion with them. But for them to go after the U.N. ambassador — who had nothing to do with Benghazi and was simply making a presentation based on intelligence that she had received — and to besmirch her reputation is outrageous.”

Less than an hour later, McCain took to the Senate floor to say: “I understand the president of the United States today took some umbrage at our statements.”

Whoever is accountable for the Benghazi attack “must be held responsible,” the senator said. “This president and this administration has either been guilty of colossal incompetence or engaged in a coverup.”

Ed O’Keefe, Anne Gearan and Julie Tate contributed to this report.

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