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“BENGHAZI INVESTIGATION” mentioning the U.S. Dept of State was published in the House of Representatives section on pages H4489-H4490 on July 16, 2013.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
BENGHAZI INVESTIGATION
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Wolf) for 5 minutes.
Mr. WOLF. Mr. Speaker, Deuteronomy 16:20 tells us:
Justice, justice shalt thou pursue.
As we quietly mark the 10-month anniversary of the Benghazi terrorist attacks last week, I know many people wondered if there will ever be any clear resolution to this investigation, let alone justice.
There are less than 3 weeks remaining before the Congress departs for the August recess. When we return in September, we will be only 2 days away from the 1-year anniversary of the Benghazi attacks. This looming anniversary should stand as a stark reminder of the many unanswered questions that remain about what actually happened that night and how the administration chose to respond or not respond to the Americans under assault during that 8-hour period.
That is why, over the next 3 weeks, I will be coming to the floor regularly to remind the American people about the key questions that remain to be answered. I will also be sending a series of letters to the State Department, the Defense Department, and the CIA formally requesting responses to some of these questions. While I am skeptical the administration will be forthcoming with answers, I do hope that these questions will underscore, for the Congress and the American people, the woefully incomplete status of the Benghazi investigation.
I have long been concerned that the current investigative strategy would not yield the necessary answers. That is why, for the last 8 months, I have advocated creating a bipartisan select committee to thoroughly investigate the Benghazi attacks. My bill, H. Res. 36, has 160 cosponsors, as well as the support of many family members of the Benghazi victims, the Special Operations community, and the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, which represent the Diplomatic Security agents who were at the consulate in Benghazi.
Perhaps the most telling sign of the incomplete state of the Benghazi investigation is the fact that not one of the survivors of the Benghazi attack from the consulate or the annex has publicly testified before Congress. Despite nearly a full year of multiple committee investigations, not one witness has been brought before a committee to publicly testify under oath about what happened that night.
Instead of learning the details of the attack and the U.S. response in public hearings, the American people may instead read about it in one of the books that have been announced in recent weeks. It is clear that the survivors from the consulate and the annex have worked with authors on two separate books that are scheduled to be published over the next year.
The first, ``Under Fire: The Untold Story of the Attack in Benghazi,'' describes in vivid, minute-by-minute detail the assault on the U.S. consulate, according to an excerpt that was published in Vanity Fair magazine this month. This excerpt contains important new information about the level of sophistication of the attack and how the terrorists apparently had detailed inside knowledge of the American consulate. It also noted that each of the terrorists' vehicles flew the
``black flag of jihad.'' The report makes clear this attack was the result of careful planning and intelligence-gathering by the terrorists, not some spontaneous attack on a target of opportunity.
A second, $3 million book deal, scheduled for publication in 2014, was announced last month with four unnamed U.S. security contractors who were based at the annex and responded to the attacks that night. I suspect, given the critical role played by the contractors in responding to the consulate attack and later in defending the annex, that these individuals have important information that deserves to be heard by the Congress and by the American people. I also wonder, Mr. Speaker, whether any of the $3 million they're earning from the book deal will be shared with Ty Woods' widow and child or the parents of Glen Doherty, who did so much to save our Americans.
I can't help but ask why the Congress has not asked--or subpoenaed--
these individuals to testify before the House committees that have been investigating this over the past year. If these questions are not answered, the American people will never know what took place in Benghazi.
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