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Meet The 5 Democrats On Trey Gowdy’s Benghazi Panel

Meet The 5 Democrats On Trey Gowdy’s Benghazi Panel

Pelosi Benghazi

AFP Photo/Win Mcnamee

Here we go again.

Her hand forced by Darrell Issa, Trey Gowdy and other House Republicans, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) nominated five Democrats to the select committee created to re-investigate the 2012 Benghazi attacks. The number-one goal for these Democrats, it seems, is to keep pressure on Gowdy and their Republican counterparts. It’s sure to be no easy task.

To that end, Pelosi chose members of her caucus who have been involved in previous Benghazi investigations. Pelosi’s five appointees have unique knowledge of the events, and will have to use it to challenge Republican talking points.

As The New York Times notes, if Gowdy raises issues that have been noted previously, these seasoned Democrats will be able to dismiss them as frivolous. If he introduces new evidence of wrongdoing, they will be able to raise questions about why it was not unearthed by agencies that have already investigated the attack.

In short, as Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD) put it: “We need someone in the room to simply defend the truth.”

Here’s a look at the Democrats charged with defending the truth on the newly formed Benghazi panel.

Elijah Cummings

elijah cummings

If there is one lawmaker who knows what to expect from a Republican-led investigative panel, it’s Rep. Elijah Cummings. Cummings is a veteran. As the ranking Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, he has sparred with Republicans like Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) for countless hours over investigations into the IRS and Benghazi.

So, Elijah Cummings has a game plan for what lies ahead. He toldTheHuffington Post on Wednesday that his primary goal is to identify which pieces of information Republicans seek to investigate. This will, according to Cummings, limit conspiracy theories that may balloon if the parameters of the investigation are not defined.

Additionally, Rep. Cummings says he is fully ready to search for the truth, but he cannot ignore false narratives that have already been pushed by House Republicans.

“I’m looking for the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Whatever that is,” he said. “But you gotta keep in mind, you cannot disregard what we have seen, and that is allegations being made unfairly and in many instances untruthfully, and then there’s a search for the facts to back them up. So what that does is it puts us in a situation where it’s very difficult to have trust.”

Adam Smith

adam state

Photo: Washington State Dept. of Transportation via Flickr

Washington’s Adam Smith may be the most cynical Democrat nominated to the special committee. Smith, ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, has made his disdain for the various probes into the events of Benghazi very well known. In 2013, for example, he labeled the Benghazi investigation a “political witch hunt.”

“Republicans in Congress have turned the death of an ambassador and three other Americans into a political witch hunt. For nearly eight months, we have watched Republicans desperately and obsessively search for a scandal, which has not appeared,” Smith said in May 2013.

For Smith, the new panel is more of the same. In a press conference Wednesday, he lamented the formation of the investigative committee, but said he would do his best to set the record straight. “This is a committee that should not have been formed,” he said. “But since the Republicans chose to form it, I think we have to participate to do our best to bring out the correct arguments.”

Adam B. Schiff

Like Smith, Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-CA) argued that Democrats should not give any credibility to this new committee. Schiff, a member of the influential (especially in terms of the Benghazi investigations) Intelligence Committee, called the new effort a “colossal waste of time” on Fox News Sunday this month.

“We’ve had four bipartisan investigations already,” he told host Chris Wallace. Noting that another investigation will further waste taxpayer money, he added, “I don’t think it makes sense, really, for Democrats to participate…I think it’s just a tremendous red herring and a waste of taxpayer resources.”

Nevertheless, when Pelosi tapped him for the role on the committee, Schiff agreed. He made note of his reservations in a statement released Wednesday, writing: “I’ve been involved in the investigation into Benghazi from day one as a member of the Intelligence Committee because like every other American I want to know what happened, why it happened, how we can keep it from happening again, and I want to bring to justice those that perpetrated this horrible attack. But almost 18 months later, and after 8 reports from House and Senate committees and the Accountability Review Board, the questions that this select committee purports to investigate have been asked and answered time and time and time again.”

Linda T. Sanchez

Linda Sanchez

Photo: John Taylor via Flickr

Rep. Linda Sanchez (D-CA) is currently the ranking Democrat on the House Ethics Committee. Her attitude toward the Benghazi committee seems to put the emphasis on the families affected by the attack.

She said in a statement about her appointment: “Although I am disheartened that we are putting the families affected by this tragedy through this partisan exercise, I am committed to looking at the evidence and making decisions based on what that evidence shows.”

Despite her receptiveness, Sanchez has her reservations about keeping partisanship out of this committee.

“Leaving politics out of the room is going to be a challenge for this committee, but our responsibility to the American people is to carefully analyze the facts, and not just make up allegations,” her statement continues. “I hope my Republican colleagues will adhere to the same principles.”

Tammy Duckworth

Tammy Duckworth

Photo: The National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare via Flickr

Rep. Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) may be the perfect Democrat for the new Benghazi committee. Duckworth is an Iraq War veteran who currently serves on the House Armed Services Committee and the House Committee on Oversight and Government reform. In her role on both, Duckworth has spent time investigating the terror attacks in Benghazi.

Importantly, Duckworth is prepared to play up her military experience in her new role. In a press conference accepting her position on the committee, Duckworth said: “I sat in a committee where the testimony of a man [Retired Adm. Mike Mullen, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff] with over 30 years of military experience on whether or not there were capacities for military aircraft to make it to Benghazi in time was questioned by someone with no military experience, questioning his judgment as a military commander.”

“I want to make sure that no American diplomat, no American life, no American servicemember is ever put in the same kind of jeopardy where we don’t have the resources there to protect them as they carry out this nation’s business around the world,” she added.

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Lawmakers Push For New ‘High-Value Detainee Complex’ At Guantanamo

Lawmakers Push For New ‘High-Value Detainee Complex’ At Guantanamo

By Carol Rosenberg, The Miami Herald

MIAMI — Some members of Congress want to build a new secret prison for the alleged 9/11 mastermind and other former CIA captives at Guantanamo, a project once proposed by the U.S. Southern Command but then dropped due to lack of Obama administration support.

Republicans at the House Armed Services Committee inserted $69 million for the new “high-value detainee complex” in its spending bill Wednesday night that earmarked a total of $93 million for new construction at the prison camps in Cuba.

The move is the latest in the legislative tug-of-war with the White House over President Barack Obama’s blocked ambition to close the prison camps where some 2,200 soldiers and civilian staff are responsible for the last 154 war-on-terror captives at the U.S. Navy base in Cuba.

Construction, however, is not certain. The money could be removed from the legislation as the massive National Defense Authorization Bill goes through the full Congress. The same funding bill also forbids the transfer of any Guantanamo prisoner to the United States for trial or further detention.

U.S. Rep. Mac Thornberry of Texas, the second-highest-ranking Republican on the Armed Services Committee after retiring Chairman Buck McKeon of California, argued for the new secret prison at the committee meeting that approved the bill Wednesday night. He announced that the U.S. Army notified Congress more than a year ago that it was designing a new “high-value detainee complex at Guantanamo Bay.”

At Guantanamo, the military calls the complex Camp 7 and says it’s built on a clandestine location at the 45-square-mile Navy base and run by a secret U.S. Army unit called Task Force Platinum.

“The one they have now is falling apart,” Thornberry announced Wednesday.

Camp 7 is where the military houses 15 former CIA prisoners, including six men awaiting death penalty trials — Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four alleged accomplices accused of plotting the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and the alleged plotter of al-Qaida’s 2000 suicide bombing of the USS Cole destroyer, Abd al Rahim al Nashiri.

They were sent to Guantanamo’s Camp 7 in 2006. But because the military considers all aspects of the said-to-be failing prison building to be classified, it is not known how much was spent on the current Camp 7, when it was built or by what contractor.

Marine Gen. John F. Kelly, commander of the U.S. Southern Command, which runs the detention center, had been lobbying for the new prison for more than a year. But the Defense Department declined to include the new building project in its proposed 2015 budget, leaving the military to say its engineers would reinforce the secret building rather than build a new one.

Then Wednesday, Thornberry revived the issue by reading from what he described as a communication from the Department of the Army:

“Existing facilities have far exceeded their service life expectancy and are deteriorating rapidly. The inefficiencies experienced in proper separation, seclusion and control of the occupants put Joint Task Force Guantanamo staff at risk … If this project is not funded detainees will continue to be housed in facilities that will degrade to the point of risking failure to meet operational, life and health-safety standards.”

Thornberry added that the Army needed the new prison, “not only for the detainees but for our folks.”

At Guantanamo, the prison’s public affairs officer, Navy Cmdr John Filostrat, would not elaborate Thursday on the risk to Task Force Platinum troops presented by the building’s ostensibly failing infrastructure. “We don’t talk about Camp 7 operations,” he replied by email.

Thornberry announced the “risk” after Rep. Adam Smith, the senior Democratic on the House Armed Services Committee from Washington state, opposed the new Camp 7 funding and sought to spend it instead on West Coast missile defense radar and other military construction projects.

Smith has argued for some time that the Guantanamo detention center is unnecessarily expensive by nature of its remote location. He also argued, and lost, a bid Wednesday to strip out the transfer restrictions from the 2015 funding bill.

“In this country right we now already hold literally hundreds, if not thousands, of terrorists, mass murderers, pedophiles, incredibly dangerous people,” he said, arguing that U.S. territory could absorb a few more from Guantanamo.

Southcom’s spokesman, Army Col. Greg Julian, said the command would not comment on the beyond-the-budget request for the facility. Kelly, Southcom’s commander, had in the past lobbied Congress for $49 million in Camp 7 funding.

In testimony to Congress in February, he called the facility he sought and failed to replace the year before as “increasingly unsustainable due to drainage and foundation issues.”

No military or committee spokesman could account for the $20 million increase in funding over Southcom’s original request.

In March, the prison camps commander, Rear Adm. Richard Butler blamed bad site selection for the secret prison, which is built on a shifting piece of ground on the base that has caused walls and floors to crack and doors to no longer close.

Two other major prison camp construction projects did make the administration’s proposed Guantanamo construction list for the coming year, and were included in the spending bill that cleared the committee Wednesday night:

—A new $12 million dining room for the prison camp’s staff, including the guard force, to replace the existing oceanfront Seaside Galley that the military recently renamed Camp America Galley. Kelly dined with troops there at Thanksgiving.

—A new $11.8 million detainee medical facility, dubbed a health clinic in congressional budget documents, to replace an expeditionary hospital that’s set up along the coast to treat Guantanamo’s majority low-value detainees.

Separately, the House committee refused a Southcom request for $20.3 million to acquire its first full-time ship, a 328-foot-long oceanographic survey vessel the USNS Sumner to sail around the Caribbean and South America to help in anti-drug smuggling operations.

The government-owned Sumner, whose stated mission was to “support worldwide oceanography programs, including performing acoustical, biological, physical and geophysical surveys,” is due to arrive at Port Canaveral this weekend for deactivation, according to the Maritime Sealift Command, which operates the vessel.

AFP Photo/Chantal Valery 

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Congress Has Spent Millions On Benghazi Investigation With Hunts: Real Costs

Congress Has Spent Millions On Benghazi Investigation With Hunts: Real Costs

The House of Representatives’ never-ending dishonest, partisan hearings on the attack that killed four Americans in Benghazi, Libya in 2012 have long since been exposed as a waste of time. Now, thanks to the Pentagon, we know that they have also been a waste of money.

As The Associated Pressreported on Tuesday evening, on March 11 the Pentagon sent a letter to Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA), which revealed that Congress’ numerous investigations into the attack have cost millions of dollars and thousands of hours of personnel time.

“The Department has devoted thousands of man-hours to responding to numerous and often repetitive congressional requests regarding Benghazi,” the letter reads. “The total cost of compliance with Benghazi-related congressional requests sent to the Department and other agencies is estimated to be in the millions of dollars.”

The letter goes on to note that “these investigations validate the conclusion of the Accountability Review Board led by Ambassador Pickering and Admiral Mullen,” which revealed that interagency response to the attacks “was timely and appropriate.”

Rep. Smith responded to the letter by writing one of his own, to House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon (R-CA).

“We must stop wasting this committee’s and our military’s scarce resources chasing a scandal that does not exist,” Smith wrote, according to The Hill.

“More than any other committee in Congress, this committee should understand the financial strain on the Department of Defense, which is being made worse by these ongoing and ridiculous investigations,” he added.

Although the numerous hearings have accomplished little (aside from blowing the CIA’s cover in Libya), McKeon appears to have no intention of heeding Smith’s advice. In a statement, his spokesman Cluade Chafin retorted that “it is important that the committee see this oversight effort through to its conclusion.”

Meanwhile, the House Oversight Committee, which led many of the Benghazi inquiries under the leadership of Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), is still busy examining another fake scandal. As Rep. Smith urges an end to the costly Benghazi witch hunt, Congressman Issa is going all-out in his effort to prove illegal IRS political targeting that never actually occurred.

For those of you keeping score at home, those investigations have already cost taxpayers at least $14 million.

Photo: gregwest98 via Flickr