Clinton Testifies on Benghazi, and Lets Others Do the Shouting

Washington: Republican lawmakers spent more than eight hours aggressively questioning Hillary Rodham Clinton on Thursday, seeking to build a case that the former secretary of state had been derelict in her duty to secure the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, in the months before the 2012 terrorist attacks that killed four Americans.

Billed by Republicans leaders of the select House committee investigating the Benghazi attacks as a critical moment in its inquiry, the long-awaited appearance by the leading Democratic presidential candidate served largely as a replay of highly contested arguments from previous congressional hearings, press examinations and Sunday-morning talk shows.

"Why were there so many requests for security equipment and personnel and why were those requests denied in Washington?" Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., the committee chairman, demanded to know as he opened the hearing Thursday morning "What did our leaders in Washington do or not do, and when?"

But the long day of often-testy exchanges between committee members and their prominent witness revealed little new information about an episode that has been the subject of seven previous investigations, and that Republicans have long seen as a blemish on Clinton's record that could be exploited as she sought the presidency.

Held in the ornate room that is home to the House Ways and Means Committee, the hearing provided Republicans with a national audience as they grilled Clinton, often using her own words from thousands of pages of emails obtained by the committee. But it also gave Clinton her first opportunity since early 2013 to respond directly to her fiercest critics, and she used the platform to offer lengthy explanations of her diplomatic efforts around the world and her actions before and after Benghazi attacks.

Perhaps stung by recent admissions that the pursuit of Clinton's emails was politically motivated, Republican lawmakers on the panel for the most part avoided any mention of her use of a private email server. Still, Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, did raise the issue late in the hearing, accusing her of repeatedly changing her account of the server and why she had used it.

In a heated exchange, Clinton repeated that she had made a mistake in using a private email account, but insisted that she never sent or received anything marked classified and had sought to be transparent by publicly releasing her emails.

Committee Republicans focused most of their time on accusations that Clinton had ignored the security needs in Benghazi in the months before the attacks, a charge that she repeatedly rejected as false.

Throughout the day, Democrats on the committee portrayed Republicans as the leaders of a partisan crusade against Clinton, while Republicans angrily responded that Democrats were seeking to block a legitimate inquiry into fatal security lapses at a U.S. diplomatic outpost. Shortly before the committee broke for lunch, a shouting match erupted between Gowdy and two Democrats - Reps. Adam B. Schiff and Elijah E. Cummings - about the committee's focus on Clinton's email exchanges with Sidney Blumenthal, a former aide to her husband and a personal friend.

As the hearing went on into the evening, exasperated Democrats on the committee said they might end their participation on the committee.

"Imagining what it would be like if we weren't present is a strong reason to participate, but at the same time I hate to give them any patina of respectability," said Schiff, D-Calif.

In her testimony, Clinton sought to project an image of composure and authority, challenging the committee in her opening statement to "reach for statesmanship" in its long-running inquiry. Alternately bemused and disdainful but never showing anger, Clinton recalled on several occasions the courage of J. Christopher Stevens, the ambassador to Libya, and the three others who died at the mission in Benghazi.

She again took responsibility for the attacks in which they died, but insisted that as secretary of state she had never personally approved or denied requests for extra security for the facility where they were based. And she told lawmakers that the United States must not back away from an assertive diplomacy because of the episode.

"Retreat from the world is not an option," Clinton told lawmakers. She called accusations that she had contributed to the death of Stevens, a personal friend, "personally painful" and "deeply distressing."

Clinton added: "I've lost more sleep than all of you put together. I have been wracking my brain about what more could have been done or should have been done."

Clinton at times used her hours in the witness chair to chide the Republican-led committee for what she called a failure to pursue a bipartisan search for the truth. In her opening statement, and later in response to prodding by friendly Democratic lawmakers, she said investigations of previous tragedies were handled cooperatively by both parties.

"That's what happened during the Reagan administration, when Hezbollah attacked our embassy," Clinton said, citing similar bipartisanship around investigations under Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. "I would like us to get back to those times."

Democrats on the panel echoed that theme. Schiff accused Republicans of pursuing a kind of prosecution against Hillary Clinton in an attempt to damage her presidential campaign.

"I think the core theory is this - that you deliberately interfered with security in Benghazi and that resulted in people dying," he told Clinton. "Notwithstanding how many investigations we've had that have found absolutely no merit to that, that is the impression they wish to give."

"This is not a prosecution, Mr. Schiff," Gowdy responded.

In the course of the hearing, Republicans did reveal some new evidence of contradictions in Clinton's statements on Benghazi, such as a transcript they obtained of a call she made to the Egyptian prime minister on the day of the attack showed that she gave a different account of its causes than the one contained in a public statement an hour earlier.  

Clinton responded that the situation was "fluid" and fast-moving, but defended her comments.

The committee repeatedly harped on Clinton's relationship with Blumenthal, who worked in the White House during Bill Clinton's presidency but had been barred by the Obama administration from working for her at the State Department.

Well known in Washington but not a household name outside the Beltway, Blumenthal in some ways became the surprise star of the lengthy hearing, his name popping up again and again.

In several instances, Republicans said that she was preoccupied with reading homemade intelligence memos from Blumenthal instead of worrying about the security at the outpost. The Republicans said that it made no sense that Blumenthal had unfettered access to Clinton, yet Stevens did not have her email address.

Republicans also suggested repeatedly that Clinton ignored requests by Americans in Benghazi for more security. Rep. Mike Pompeo of Kansas quizzed Clinton on why she did not personally respond to more than 600 requests for security from State Department employees in Benghazi even though she often responded to Blumenthal.

"The folks that worked for you didn't have the same courtesy," Pompeo said.

Clinton responded that Blumenthal is "a friend of mine," but she insisted that it had been proper to leave questions about the provision of security in Benghazi to the State Department officials who regularly handled security issues.

Gowdy pressed Clinton on why requests to get supplies to Libyans made their way to her, yet emails requesting more security from Stevens never reached her inbox. Clinton repeatedly told Gowdy that Stevens had communicated with her staff, including a senior policy aide, Jake Sullivan, and security personnel in the State Department.

"He did not raise security with the members of my staff," she said. "He raised security with the security professionals."

She added: "I know that's not the answer you want to hear. But those are the facts."

"If he had raised it with me," she continued, "I would be here telling you he had."