AP Labels Official House Benghazi Hearings as 'GOP Hearing'

On Wednesday, the Associated Press mischaracterized the Benghazi hearings as merely a Republican event, even though it is an official House committee investigation.

In the headline of its report, the Associated Press downplayed the official hearings of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee–that has both Democrats and Republicans on it–into the failures surrounding the 2012 attacks on our embassy personnel in Benghazi, Libya. The AP characterized the official hearings as “GOP hearings,” making the proceedings seem like a mere political witch-hunt.

The piece written by Donna Cassata was headlined, “GOP Benghazi hearing stokes political controversy.”

The hearing on Benghazi is not a “GOP hearing,” but is instead an official hearing of the House, with representatives of both parties sitting at the head of the proceedings.

The bias in the piece doesn’t begin and end in the headline, either. Cassata inserts her opinion into the description of the day’s events as well.

Her fourth paragraph is a perfect example of that bias (emphasis added).

Nearly eight months later, Republicans continue to investigate despite an exhaustive independent review and hours of testimony from senior administration officials.

Cassata was so insistent that readers get that the GOP is somehow ignoring that “exhaustive independent review” that she had to say it twice in the same article.

The AP writer goes on to use emotionally loaded terms, such as claiming that Republicans are engaging in a “bitter dispute” with Obama and that Hillary Clinton is the “target” of much “conservative wrath.”

The AP report also characterizes the GOP investigation into the death of a U.S. ambassador as just a move to “stoke” controversy in order to keep the matter alive into the 2016 presidential election.

Cassata ends her report firmly characterizing the whole hearing as nothing but a political move by conservatives.

Conservatives who are vital to the GOP in turning out the vote in midterm elections have pressured the party to act forcefully in investigating the Benghazi assault. In the House, more than 130 rank-and-file Republicans have signed onto a resolution calling for Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, to create a special select committee to look into the attacks, seeing the latest GOP investigation as less than satisfactory.

To Cassata, House Republicans and “conservatives” are not interested in getting to the truth; the hearing is only a ruse to increase turnout for the 2014 and 2016 elections.