Ryan
Kelsey
Politicization of the U.S. House Select
Committee on Benghazi
On the evening of September 11,
2012, armed militants raided an American compound in Benghazi, Libya, killing
four individuals including American Ambassador Christopher Stevens. In the process of making sense of this
senseless assault, communication between government officials became jumbled
and a clear account of the tragic events of that day were never accurately
presented to the public. Seeing that the
presidential election came to a conclusion in two short months, Congressional
Republicans and conservative pundits were eager to place blame and create
conspiracies about the Obama administration, specifically Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton and Susan Rice.
Consequently, a largely Republican movement began to investigate the
attack for any wrongdoing, resulting in the House Select Committee on
Benghazi. On September 29th,
Rep. Kevin McCarthy implied that this committee was to thank for the slipping
poll numbers of now Presidential candidate Clinton, implying its motives were
mainly political. On October 7th,
a House motion to disband the committee concluded with a 240-183 vote against
it. Why are some members of Congress so
reluctant to let such a politically charged committee fade? Furthermore, what has the committee uncovered
over the years in terms of evidence of wrongdoing?
Over three years after its creation,
the committee has found little of substance.
The committee has held public hearings with several high-ranking State
Department officials, USAFRICOM officers as well as intelligence
officials. Throughout all of these
hearings, there has been no major evidence pointing to wrongdoing by any
government officials. Granted, this
committee, in collaboration with the DoD and intelligence agencies, has been
able to uncover the identities of militants responsible for carrying out the
attack. However, the select committee’s
website’s main focus is not on investigating who was responsible for the
attacks, but which government officials allowed it to happen.
Combining these facts with Rep.
McCarthy’s recent statements on the biggest outcome of the committee, it
becomes evident that it exists currently for purely political purposes. This makes the recent House vote alarming. Well over half of the members of the House of
Representatives still believe that this committee is still important enough to
stick around. What effects does this
have on the Obama Administration’s actions?
With the Obama Presidency coming to
an end in a little over a year, staffers and appointees are going to be looking
to earn a job in the next administration.
If Republicans are still willing to investigate individuals three years
after the Benghazi attack, then these public officials may be reluctant to take
risks because of the potential risks to their career should something go
wrong. This could have a negative effect
on the Obama Administration, especially with the expansion of ISIS, Russian
aggression and the Taliban resurgence popping up near an election cycle. If Obama wants a Democrat to win in 2016,
thereby extending his legacy, he will need to take risks to solve these
problems. With tentative staffers around
him, this could become a problem.
I believe this committee should wrap
up its investigation in order to prepare to be shutdown. It has been three years since the Benghazi
attack and there is no conclusive evidence tying government officials to
wrongdoing. Their findings on system
flaws that led to the attack should be recorded to ensure that the committee’s
recommendations are incorporated into government structure. Once this is done, the committee should move
on and become a thing of the past. However,
since this committee has stained Clinton’s record as Secretary of State and has
caused her ratings to go down, this is not likely to happen, as Republicans
will be reluctant to rid themselves of ammunition leading up to 2016.
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