Tensions erupt on Benghazi hearings

Leaders clash over content of Clinton emails

WASHINGTON — Partisan tensions between the leaders of the House committee investigating the 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya, erupted Sunday, just four days before Hillary Rodham Clinton is scheduled to testify at a public hearing.

As the committee’s chairman, Rep. Trey Gowdy, RS.C., prepared to go on television to provide his latest defense of the investigation, the committee’s top Democrat, Rep. Elijah E. Cummings of Maryland, released information undercutting one of Gowdy’s recent allegations about Clinton’s use of her private email when she was secretary of state.

Gowdy had claimed this month that messages sent and received by Clinton included the name of a CIA source in Libya. That information was “some of the most protected information in our intelligence community,” Gowdy said. The fact that Clinton sent and received these materials, he said, debunked her “claim that she never sent any classified information from her private email address.”

But Cummings said Sunday that the CIA had informed the committee that information about the source was not classified.

“Unfortunately, the standard operating procedure of this select committee has become to put out information publicly that is inaccurate and out of context in order to attack Secretary Clinton for political reasons,” Cummings said in a letter to Gowdy. “These repeated actions bring discredit on this investigation and undermine the integrity of the select committee and the House of Representatives.”

Three hours after Cummings released his letter, Gowdy responded, saying Cummings had mischaracterized what the CIA told the committee. The name of the source had been redacted from the email by the Obama administration, Gowdy said in a letter of his own, and “the fact that the CIA says it didn’t do it does not mean the material was not sensitive or classified.”

“As usual, I would ask you to completely and accurately relate the facts rather than attempt to create an impression that is misleading based on an incomplete and selective recitation of the facts,” Gowdy said.

At the end of the letter, Gowdy criticized the Obama administration, which he has contended has refused to hand over documents he has requested.

“I am envious of your staff ’s ability to get information from this administration in less than 45 minutes on a weekend,” Gowdy said. “This is something the majority members struggle to do on weekdays. Perhaps you would be willing to help us gain access to the information the committee has been seeking from the administration for over half a year now.”

Gowdy and Cummings continued their argument in separate appearances on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”