Gowdy to McCarthy on Benghazi Committee Remarks: ‘You’re Wrong’

Wednesday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC), the chair of the House Select Committee on Benghazi, reacted to remarks made last week by House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), the leading candidate to replace House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) as Speaker of the House.

“Everybody thought Hillary Clinton was unbeatable, right?” McCarthy said on Fox News Channel’s “Hannity” on Sept. 29. “But we put together a Benghazi Special Committee, a select committee. What are her numbers today?”

Gowdy prefaced his remarks by referring to McCarthy as a “friend,” but said McCarthy was wrong to categorize the committee as a political tool.

“Kevin is not on the Benghazi committee,” Gowdy said. “Kevin, I’m sure, doesn’t know we’ve interviewed 41 witnesses that none of the previous committees have interviewed, including seven eyewitnesses. So, I would just respectfully ask folks to look at what we’ve done and look at October 22 and you’ll see a fact-centric, professional fair hearing and that’s all I can do is ask people to focus on actions and not words.”

“[H]e is a friend, but my first reaction is, ‘Kevin, you’re wrong,’” he added. “When Speaker Boehner called me, he never mentioned Secretary Clinton’s name. In fact, we’ve had three public hearings, Joe. I never mentioned her name. If you look at what we’ve done, the 50-some odd witnesses we’ve already interviewed, not a single one has been named Clinton. The 50,000 documents we have accessed that no other committee has accessed, less than 5 percent had anything to do with her. She was the secretary of state at all relevant times. Of course you would have to talk to here.  But we didn’t start with her and we’re not going to end with her. And in fact, I’ve been pretty patient with when she came before the committee. I still won’t have all her emails, Joe. As you know we got a 1,000.”

Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor

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