Kevin McCarthy Weaponized Benghazi Hearings to Help Defeat Hillary Clinton and Now Wants to Nix a January 6 Commission That Would Reveal the Truth About Trump's Sedition
May 19, 2021
Is Kevin McCarthy about to get Benghazied by a House Select Committee on January 6 if the commission is voted down in the Senate? That would be divine justice. (Gage Skidmore)
MARK KARLIN, EDITOR OF BUZZFLASH
If there is anything that Kevin McCarthy fears the most about a January 6 investigation commission, it’s that he would be subpoenaed and have to disclose his devastating conversation in which Trump scolded him that he cared more about protecting the Capitol than supporting insurrectionists backing “The Big Lie.”
Back in September of 2015, McCarthy said out loud what the House Republicans were denying at the time. A September 30, 2015 Vox article was entitled, “A top House Republican was accidentally honest about the Benghazi investigation”:
During an appearance on Sean Hannity's Fox News show, McCarthy bragged that the House GOP's investigation into the Benghazi attack had made Hillary Clinton's poll numbers plummet. Furthermore, he presented it as part of a "strategy to fight and win," rather than a nonpartisan effort to find the truth.
Here's what he said, via Roll Call:
What you’re going to see is a conservative speaker, that takes a conservative Congress, that puts a strategy to fight and win. And let me give you one example. Everybody thought Hillary Clinton was unbeatable, right?
But we put together a Benghazi special committee. A select committee. What are her numbers today? Her numbers are dropping. Why? Because she’s untrustable. But no one would have known that any of that had happened had we not fought to make that happen.
"I give you credit for that," Hannity responded. "I'll give you credit where credit is due."
Meanwhile, Democrats felt vindicated, although McCarthy was right: the GOP had smeared Clinton enough with multiple Benghazi hearings, including a “Select Committee,” to allow Trump a bare electoral win despite Clinton handily winning the popular vote.
According to the Washington Post:
Democrats pounced, seeing vindication of their months-long warnings Republicans planned to use the House Select Committee on Benghazi — ultimately one of six probes by Republican-controlled House committees about the deadly 2012 attacks on U.S. facilities in Benghazi, Libya — as merely a blunt partisan object to try to crush Clinton’s presidential aspirations.
This month, McCarthy tasked Congressman James Katko (R-NY) to negotiate a January 6 commission that met Republican demands. The Democrats surprised McCarthy by agreeing to his terms, with many progressives fearing that the final commission agreement ended up potentially toothless because of the parity allowed Republicans. In short, McCarthy got what he asked for.
However, Trump issued an angry call from Mar-a-Lago to vote down the commission, and McCarthy turned against the commission terms he had agreed to and is now having Congressman Steve Scalise (R-LA) whip the House vote against convening a commission.
Meanwhile, on Wednesday the pompous, pretentious, disingenuous Mitch McConnell told his Senate caucus to vote against the commission. According to Common Dreams,
"After careful consideration, I've made the decision to oppose the House Democrats' slanted and unbalanced proposal for another commission to study the events of January 6," McConnell (R-Ky.) said on the Senate floor.
[Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer chastised McConnell]: “Shame on the Republicans for choosing the Big Lie over the truth... The American people will see for themselves whether our Republican friends stand on the side of truth or on the side of Donald Trump's Big Lie."
Senate GOP Whip John Thune (R-SD) told CNN what was in plain sight. They didn’t want a commission that might drag into 2022 (although the agreement would have it end by December 31, 2021) exposing revelations of Republican complicity in the January 6 coup attempt, particularly the role of Trump and the GOP support of “the Big Lie” in the House and the Senate. They are scared stiff that a January 6 commission might become weaponized against the GOP as Beghanzi was.
Thune told CNN:
"I want our midterm message to be on the kinds of things that the American people are dealing with: That's jobs and wages and the economy and national security, safe streets and strong borders -- not relitigating the 2020 elections," Thune told CNN. "A lot of our members, and I think this is true of a lot of House Republicans, want to be moving forward and not looking backward. Anything that gets us rehashing the 2020 elections I think is a day lost on being able to draw a contrast between us and the Democrats' very radical left-wing agenda."
What is the alternative if McCarthy and McConnell seek a commission that would expose the truth about the Republicans, Trump and sedition? Ironically, one of the main options would be for Nancy Pelosi and Democratic House leadership could create a Select Committee with a Democratic majority that would not be a Benghazi assault because it would be focused on revealing the truth about the betrayal of democracy on January 6, not just on soiling a politician.
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