Clinton Turns Down Request to Testify on Benghazi Next Week

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Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has turned down an invitation to testify before the House Foreign Affairs Committee next Thursday on the Benghazi attack.

A committee update this evening indicated that Michael Courts, acting director of International Affairs and Trade for the Government Accountability Office, will be testifying followed by a RAND Corp. analyst.

The committee indicated further witnesses could be added, but the State Department confirmed that Clinton won’t be one of them.

“She was asked to appear at House Foreign Affairs next week, and we have written back to the chairman to say that she’ll be on travel next week,” said department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland. She did not answer a question about whether Clinton would be willing to fly back from Australia to address either the Foreign Affairs panel or the Senate and House closed-door intelligence committee hearings getting to the root of the Benghazi scandal.

“The Committee plans to hold the second segment of this hearing the week of November 26, 2012 and will request Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton testify before the Committee at that time,” the Foreign Affairs Committee said in an advisory.

Committee Chairwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) wrote Clinton on Tuesday to demand that the State Department respond to the panel’s requests for information on Benghazi.

“It is disappointing that we have yet to receive any response from your Department and that we are receiving more information from the press than from the Administration,” Ros-Lehtinen wrote.

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