WASHINGTON, D.C. — Benghazi will not be old news until the outstanding questions are answered, according to Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX).
“Now some are tempted to ask, ‘What difference at this point does it make,'” Gohmert said Wednesday at a press conference marking the two-year anniversary of the Sept. 11 attack on the American facilities in Benghazi, Libya that left four Americans dead, including the U.S. ambassador to Libya, Christopher Stevens.
“And the answer should come swift and clear anytime it’s asked, because until we know what happened, we can’t avoid the same mistakes in the future,” he said.
Gohmert took the Obama administration to task for covering up the happenings in Benghazi, comparing it to Watergate.
“Now 40 years later this administration is following the example that was learned in the Clinton years, that if you keep refusing to provide documents, keep refusing to give answers, then eventually you can get to the point where you can say that’s old news. And the mainstream media can sometimes be compliant and say ‘Well it is old news,'” the Texas Republican said.
“Well, it’s not old news,” he stressed, “because we still don’t have the answers.”
Charles Woods, the father of Navy Seal Ty Woods, who was killed during the attack in Benghazi, also called for answers from the administration.
“I would rather actually not be here,” Woods said. “I would rather that my son were still alive.”
Woods said he is haunted but the lack of answers to questions, particularly why there was not a rescue attempt — recalling his experience as a Navy Seal himself and the policy to not leave a man behind.
“When a mission was compromised, the warriors, they know they will be extracted. During all of the hours that this attack happened, there was no attempt made to rescue,” he said.
“We still do not have the answers we need — the truthful answers we need as to why these American heroes were left to die,” he added.
Lt. Gen. (Ret.) William Boykin, executive vice president of the Family Research Council, added that Benghazi continues to matter because it reveals the character of the country.
“I tell you, it makes a a lot of difference, because its a matter of the character of this nation, it makes a lot of difference. Who are we as a nation? What are our national values? It makes a lot of difference.” he said.
Former Secret Service agent Dan Bongino added that Benghazi remains important.
“It will become old news when the president can explain to us where he was, what he did, and frankly why the character of the people who responded from the CIA annex to the mission complex to save those people far surpass[es] the character of the folks in his administration who lied to us since this event happened,” he said. “This is a blemish on what everything the United States stands for means.”
Also Wednesday, a day before the official anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks on Benghazi, the conservative Judicial Watch released new internal documents from the State Department obtained in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit showing that, up to three months before the attack, security guards were abandoning their posts “out of fear of their safety.”
“As best we can tell, the Freedom of Information Act, at this time, is the best way to get information out of this administration — an administration that is committed to secrecy and stonewalling on something that would have taken down previous administrations,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said at the press conference. “Which is the lying by a president and his officials, to protect his reelection, about a terrorist attack that killed four Americans.”