GOP: Dems Have Wasted More Than $2 Million Obstructing Benghazi Investigation

Democrats on the Select Committee on Benghazi would rather spend taxpayer dollars circling the wagons for Hillary Clinton than investigating what happened before, during, and after the September 11, 2012 terror attack that killed four Americans, according to fed-up Republicans on Capitol Hill.

Select Committee on Benghazi spokesman Matt Wolking says Democrats have wasted more than $2 million in taxpayer dollars on “politically-motivated efforts” to undermine and obstruct the investigation.

Wolking released a strongly worded statement today calling Democrat efforts to derail the investigation “appalling and grotesque.”

While Democrats on the Benghazi Committee have made a big show of pretending to care about the cost of this investigation, they’ve made zero meaningful contributions and spent virtually all of their time and effort on undermining and obstructing the committee’s work, directly contributing to its length and cost. Their incessant politicization of legitimate congressional oversight is appalling and grotesque, and only proves that the process could have been completed much faster if Democrats had helped with the work instead of delay it. Of course, their motivations are obvious: they’ve endorsed the former Secretary of State for president, and will no doubt continue to act as a full-fledged arm of her campaign, wasting taxpayer dollars on everything but getting answers for the families of the victims who were left without adequate security on September 11 in one of the most dangerous places in the world.

Democrats’ spending has topped $2 million, or more than one-third of the committee’s total cost.

Republicans on the Benghazi Committee have conducted a thorough, fact-centered investigation, interviewing 69 witnesses to date, including 55 who had never before been interviewed by a congressional committee. Seven of those were eyewitnesses to the attacks. Witnesses have said the committee’s questions were “very constructive” and demonstrated “professionalism and respect.” Republicans have also obtained and reviewed roughly 100,000 pages of documents, about 70,000 of which had never before been obtained or reviewed by a congressional committee.

Democrats, on the other hand, have been shilling for Hillary Clinton like they’re members of her personal legal team. According to Wolking, they have issued more than 60 press releases defending “their endorsed candidate for president,” Hillary Clinton.  Worse yet, it appears that they’ve been coordinating strategically with her campaign.

A Democratic committee spokesman told The Daily Caller that they have not been trying to obstruct the investigation at all.

“It is disappointing, and frankly sad, that Republicans are trying to blame Democrats for their wastefulness and ineffectiveness on the Benghazi Committee,” a Democratic committee spokesman told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “Democrats tried repeatedly to request an organizational meeting, adopt rules, develop an investigative plan, and speed up the investigation, but Chairman Gowdy refused every time.  As a result, the Republican investigation has been widely condemned by even the most conservative commentators as inept and dysfunctional.”

The Democrat spokesman neglected to address any of Wolking’s specific points about the Democrats on the committee, which are as follows:

• Can’t name a single witness from the Obama administration they have requested to interview.

• Can’t name a single new document they have requested from the Obama administration.

• Launched an “asked and answered database” in September 2014, before the committee interviewed a single new witness and before it obtained roughly 55,000 new pages of documents.

• Claimed “On February 13, 2015, the State Department completed its production to the Select Committee of Secretary Clinton’s emails relating to the Benghazi attacks,” two months before the committee received another 100 pages in June and five months before the committee received another 1,500 pages in September.

• Issued more than 60 press releases (and counting) defending their endorsed candidate for president.

• Did not deny “strategic coordination with the campaign” of their endorsed candidate.

• Admitted they asked every witness the same questions about their endorsed candidate.

• Are “doing her work for her,” according to CNN.

In their defense, Democrats claim they tried to impose “organizational meetings” rules, “an investigative plan,” etc.—which sound more like stalling techniques than attempts to “speed up the investigation.”