Labrador Defends McCarthy: ‘Fact’ Benghazi Revelations Hurt Hillary Politically

RUSH TRANSCRIPT:

MITCHELL: “Have Kevin McCarthy, Richard Hanna and several others seriously undermined the Benghazi committee to the point where it really is an uphill climb for that committee to do its job in a credible fashion? As they prepare to take testimony from Hillary Clinton?”

LABRADOR: “I don’t think so. I think Kevin McCarthy misspoke. If you think about what he said, I think it’s been taken out of context. He clearly was not articulating what he said but he never said that the committee was established for political reasons. He just said that the committee had political effect on her poll numbers. That’s just a statement of fact. I think the way he spoke about it, I think it was very wrong, it was very inartful, but you know, I sit next to trey Gowdy almost every day in judiciary committee and I sat next to him for two years when I was in the oversight committee. He’s one of the least partisan members of Congress. He does a great job. That’s why so many people like him, both Republicans and Democrats. So I don’t think they have undermined the work but I think they made it a little bit more difficult for him. But if you think about it, they have had over 50 witnesses. Hillary Clinton is just one of the witnesses that has been subpoenaed for this committee. I think they have done a terrific job and the only reason we’re here right now is because the president and Hillary Clinton decided four months before an election to give — to give a partisan reason for what happened in Benghazi. That should have never happened. They knew that it was a terrorist attack. They knew that these were Al Qaeda affiliates who were attacking the embassy and they decided to talk about a video and the only reason they did that is because the vice president of the United States had said that Osama bin Laden was dead and Chrysler was alive and that was the theme of their campaign. They are the ones who made it political and now they are trying to say that Trey Gowdy is a political animal. That’s just not true.”

MITCHELL: “Raul Labrador, thank you very much. Thanks for being with us.”

LABRADOR: “Thank you.”