Emails Show State Dept. Had Heavy Hand in Changing Benghazi Storyline

Published May 15, 2013

FoxNews.com

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    Benghazi investigation:Questions that still need to be asked

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    Where is Benghazi scandal headed?

WASHINGTON –  State Department officials repeatedly objected to -- and tried to water down -- references to Al Qaeda and prior security warnings in Libya in the Obama administration's initial internal story-line on the Benghazi terror attack, according to dozens of emails and notes released by the White House late Wednesday. 

The documents were released under pressure after whistle-blowers testified on the Hill and some email excerpts leaked to the media last week. The 100-page file showed that State Department officials were even more heavily involved in editing the "talking points" than was previously known. 

One email sent on the night of the Friday after the attack from an unknown sender said: "The State Department had major reservations with much or most of the document." 

Individual emails show State officials repeatedly objecting to the intelligence community's early version of events. 

The early versions stated that "Islamic extremists with ties to Al Qaeda" participated in the assault and discussed links to militant group Ansar al Sharia -- and referenced prior attacks against western targets in Benghazi. 

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland complained that she had "serious concerns" about "arming members of Congress" to make assertions the administration was not making. "In same vein, why do we want Hill to be fingering Ansar al Sharia, when we aren't doing that ourselves until we have investigation results ... and the penultimate point could be abused by Members to beat the State Department for not paying attention to Agency warnings so why do we want to feed that either? Concerned ..." 

The White House had until now declined to make the documents public and had let congressional investigators review the documents without making copies. 

The documents describe how the administration developed "talking points" to describe what the administration wanted to discuss publicly immediately after the Sept. 11, 2012, attack that killed U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans. 

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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White House's Benghazi documents

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Republicans Call for New Clinton Testimony on Benghazi Attack

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  Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.AP

WASHINGTON –  Calls are growing for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to return to Capitol Hill -- under subpoena, if necessary -- to answer new questions that have surfaced about her role in the response to the Benghazi terror attack. 

“I believe she was disconnected and dispassionate about what was happening,” House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa told Fox News on Monday.

During the interview, Issa kept the option of forcing Clinton to testify on the table. 

Conservatives have challenged Clinton’s account of what happened and how it was presented to the public in light of recent details. 

Specifically, lawmakers like Issa and New Hampshire Republican Sen. Kelly Ayotte say they want Clinton on the record about her role in watering down a CIA memo about how the attacks started -- and whether she knew about the apparent lack of security at the foreign outpost.

“Maybe, just maybe, she knew,” Issa said. 

It's unclear whether lawmakers would go so far as to subpoena the former secretary but they've suggested they'll do what it takes to bring her back to Capitol Hill, after she first testified in January. 

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R- S.C., suggested he was open to using subpoena power last week. "I hope she would come back without that, but yes," he said during an interview with USA Today. "I think she needs to come back and answer questions." 

Former Vice President Dick Cheney also told Republicans during a meeting last week that they may need to subpoena Clinton to get more answers. "I think Hillary (Clinton) should be subpoenaed if necessary," Cheney said.

The Libya controversy could undermine Clinton’s case as a future presidential candidate – something her supporters say is the real reason behind the push to get her back in the Benghazi spotlight. President Obama also pushed back against the revived controversy on Monday, calling it a political "sideshow." 

But Republicans rejected the charge as they sought new testimony from others. Issa sent letters Monday to the Benghazi Accountability Review Board (ARB) co-chairmen former Ambassador Thomas Pickering and former Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen requesting that they submit to transcribed interviews in anticipation of a public hearing on the board’s investigation. 

The letters come after three State Department officials described the report as “incomplete” and said that it let senior officials, like Clinton and her top staffers, “off the hook.”

Pickering defended his decision Sunday not to question Clinton because he said it had been concluded that the negligence that led to the attacks and the misinformation that followed was not her fault. Instead, he said the missteps were made by those working beneath her.

“We knew where the responsibility rested," Pickering told CBS’ “Face the Nation.”  “They've tried to point a finger at people more senior than where we found the decisions were made." 

Pickering said he and Mullen had to work within the legal scope of the investigation and that they “knew and understood” Clinton’s role based upon “talking to other people at meetings.” 

But lawmakers still have questions about Clinton's role in everything from considering security requests to emphasizing the role of an anti-Islam film in the days after the attack. 

Clinton reportedly told Charles Woods, the father of Navy SEAL Tyrone Woods who was killed in the attack, that the department would make sure to arrest and prosecute the maker of an anti-Islam film that had been linked to protests. Woods claimed on Glenn Beck’s online show that Clinton apologized for the attacks but said he “could tell that she was not telling me the truth.” 

That was around the time U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice claimed the attack was a “spontaneous” reaction to demonstrations over the video. The administration even paid for an ad to run in Pakistan condemning the video. 

According to news reports, the CIA’s version of the attacks changed 12 different times before being made public.

A resolution sponsored by Virginia Rep. Frank Wolf that calls on the House to form a special committee to investigate the terror attacks is gaining traction. More than 200 lawmakers have signed on to the cause.

Calls to the State Department for additional comment were not immediately returned.

Calls to Clinton’s spokesman were also not immediately returned.

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BENGHAZI BACKLASH: Did Clinton Skate Through Q&A After Deadly Attack?

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  FILE: Jan. 15, 2013: House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and other lawmakers on Capitol Hill, in Washington, D.C.AP

Congressional Republicans on Sunday pressed their investigation into the Benghazi attacks, suggesting depositions of high-ranking officials and more whistle-blowers testifying amid further questions about why then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was not thoroughly interviewed about the issue.

Rep. Mike Rogers, chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, told “Fox News Sunday” that more potential and self-proclaimed “whistle-blowers” might come forward after three of them – career State Department foreign service employees – testified last week before the House Oversight and Government Affairs Committee.

“We have had people come forward because of the (hearing) and say we would also like to talk," the Michigan Republican told “Fox News Sunday.” "I do think we're going to see more whistle-blowers. Certainly my committee has been contacted; I think other committees as well."

Rogers’ remarks came as Thomas Pickering, the former U.S. ambassador who helped write a report on security at a U.S. outpost in Benghazi, Libya, defended his assessment but absolved Clinton.

"We knew where the responsibility rested," Pickering told CBS’ “Face the Nation.”  “They've tried to point a finger at people more senior than where we found the decisions were made.”

Pickering said he and retired Adm. Mike Mullen had to work within the legal scope of the investigation and that they “knew and understood” Clinton’s role based upon “talking to other people at meetings.”

Four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, were killed in the Sept. 11, 2012, attacks on the U.S. outpost.

Congressional Republicans have since led efforts to learn whether the Obama administration provided adequate security and if the explanation of events was altered as part of a possible political cover-up.

Among the lingering questions are whether Clinton was involved in changing the CIA memo about how the attacks started, or was she at least partially responsible for the apparent lack of adequate security.

The Accountability and Review Board, led by Pickering and Mullen, did not question Clinton at length about the attacks but concluded the decisions about the consulate were made well below the secretary's level.

However, Pickering's defense of the panel's conclusions Sunday appeared to do little to quiet Republicans' calls for more accountability for the attacks, which killed Stevens, Information Officer Sean Smith, and two embassy security personnel, Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods, both former Navy SEALs.

Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the House oversight committee, told NBC’s “Meet the Press” he would like to interview under oath Pickering and Mullen, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein told NBC that Congress' review seems aimed at discrediting Clinton and her potential 2016 presidential bid.

Pickering and Mullen's report was released in December and found that "systematic failures and leadership and management deficiencies at senior levels" of the State Department meant that security was "inadequate for Benghazi and grossly inadequate to deal with the attack that took place."

The House oversight committee hearing last week included testimony from Gregory Hicks, a former deputy chief of mission to Libya.

Hicks, a self-proclaimed whistle-blower, detailed his phone conversations from Tripoli with Stevens, who died during the two nighttime attacks.

Hicks and two other State Department witnesses criticized the Pickering and Mullen review. Their complaints centered on a report they consider incomplete, with individuals who weren't interviewed and a focus on the assistant secretary level and lower.

The hours-long hearing produced no major revelation but renewed interest in the attacks that happened during the lead-up to the November 2012 presidential election.

Five days after the attacks, in the final weeks of President Obama’s re-election bid, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice went on Sunday talk shows and said the attacks were “spontaneous” and sparked by protests elsewhere in the Middle East over an anti-Islamic video.

However, new reports show the original CIA memo on the incident was scrubbed of the mention of “Islamic militants” and early intelligence about Al Qaeda in the region.

The series of emails that circulated between the State Department and the CIA led to weakened -- and, in some cases, wrong -- language that Rice used to describe the assault.

Issa also said he will on Monday request private testimonies from Pickering and Mullen and that his oversight panel has not been provided sufficient details on the State Department review.

Pickering, who was sitting next to Issa during “Meet the Press,” said he wanted to appear at the Republican-led hearing Wednesday but was blocked.

Issa said Democrats could have invited their own witnesses, such as Pickering, but did not.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., on Sunday renewed congressional Republicans’ call for a House select committee on Benghazi -- like the one used to investigate Watergate -- and called the Obama administration’s handling of the terror attacks “a cover-up.”

"I would call it a cover-up in the extent that there was willful removal of information, which was obvious,” McCain said on ABC’s “This Week.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Whistle-Blower: Talking Points Hurt FBI Investigation of Benghazi Attack

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Republican Rep. Darrell Issa said Wednesday, as the oversight committee he chairs launched into a high-profile hearing on the Benghazi attacks, that the whistle-blowers giving their version of events are "actual experts" on what happened -- who could challenge the administration's narrative. 

As the hearing began, one whistle-blower questioned Wednesday why more military assets were not deployed sooner during the Benghazi terror attack. 

Mark Thompson, a former Marine and official with the State Department's Counterterrorism Bureau, said he was rebuffed by the White House when he asked for a specialized team -- known as a FEST team -- to be deployed. This is a unit made of special operations personnel, diplomatic security, intelligence and other officers. 

Suggesting that some were hesitant to deploy because they were unsure what was happening, "One definition of a crisis is you do not know what's going to happen in two hours," he said.

Thompson spoke at the start of a major hearing where three whistle-blowers are testifying and expected to shed new light on that deadly assault. 

Issa, chairman of the oversight committee holding the hearing, called them "actual experts on what really happened before, during and after the Benghazi attacks," who "deserve to be heard." 

The three witnesses are Greg Hicks, deputy chief of mission in Libya who became top U.S. diplomat in the country after Ambassador Chris Stevens was killed in the terror attack; Eric Nordstrom, a diplomatic security officer who was formerly the regional security officer in Libya; and Thompson. 

"I am a career public servant," Hicks said. "Until the aftermath of Benghazi, I loved every day of my job." 

Nordstrom choked up as he began to testify Wednesday.  

The administration has parried Republican allegations lately by arguing that the attack is old news, that the State Department already has investigated it and that Republicans are engaged in a political witch hunt. 

Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., top Democrat on the oversight committee, also said Wednesday that Republicans are using the witnesses' statements for "political purposes." He said he's glad the whistle-blowers are testifying and would ensure they are protected, but pre-emptively challenged some of their claims -- including the claim that U.S. military could have responded sooner to the site of the attack. 

But a series of carefully timed leaks on the whistle-blowers' testimony indicates House Republicans could have the goods to at least merit a second look at the administration narrative. 

"The question is, where's the accountability for lying to the American people?" Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, told Fox News. "The American people were lied to." 

The witnesses are expected to cover a breadth of material in their testimony Wednesday. Lawmakers have questioned to what extent security requests were ignored before the attack, whether the military could have done more to respond the night of the attack and whether talking points were intentionally changed for political reasons after the attack to downplay terrorism. The witnesses could address all three areas on Wednesday. 

The Obama administration has adamantly denied several of the latest charges, including a claim that then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and a key aide tried to cut the department's own counterterrorism bureau out of the chain of reporting and decision-making on Sept. 11. The administration also denied that the whistle-blowers in question were intimidated -- while behind the scenes questioning the credibility of the witnesses. 

A "fact sheet" released by the department ahead of the hearing reiterated its denials. The statement also said the department has "demonstrated an unprecedented degree of cooperation with the Congress" on Libya, and rejected claims that the military was in a position to help that night but was told to stand down. Citing its internal review, the statement noted the review "found no evidence of any undue delays in decision making or denial of support from Washington or from the military combatant commanders."

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MOMENT OF TRUTH: Will New Testimony Expose Benghazi 'Cover-Up'?

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    Will Benghazi whistle-blowers unearth a cover-up?

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    Could the military have helped during the Benghazi attacks?

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    Bias Bash: Difference in Benghazi media coverage

Republican lawmakers hounding the Obama administration for months over unanswered questions on the Benghazi attack will have their moment, on Wednesday, to demonstrate whether the internal response amounted to a cover-up -- as whistle-blowers give long-awaited testimony expected to challenge the White House's version of events. 

The administration has parried Republican allegations lately by arguing that the attack is old news, that the State Department already has investigated it and that Republicans are engaged in a political witch hunt. 

But a series of carefully timed leaks on the whistle-blowers' testimony indicates House Republicans could have the goods to at least merit a second look at the administration narrative. 

"The question is, where's the accountability for lying to the American people?" Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, told Fox News. "The American people were lied to." 

Three whistle-blowers are set to testify shortly before noon to the oversight committee Issa chairs. 

Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, a member of that committee, said if it weren't for lawmakers' persistence, "we would be left with a whole host of lies coming out of this administration, because they were not truthful about this." 

The "truth" surrounding the Benghazi attack has been elusive. The Obama administration has adamantly denied several of the latest charges, including a claim that then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and a key aide tried to cut the department's own counterterrorism bureau out of the chain of reporting and decision-making on Sept. 11. The administration also denied that the whistle-blowers in question were intimidated -- while behind the scenes questioning the credibility of the witnesses. 

The witnesses are: Gregory N. Hicks, the deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Libya at the time of the Benghazi terrorist attacks; Mark I. Thompson, a former U.S. Marine and presently the deputy coordinator for operations in the State Department's Counterterrorism Bureau, and Eric Nordstrom, a diplomatic security officer who was formerly the regional security officer in Libya. 

The witnesses are expected to cover a breadth of material in their testimony Wednesday. Lawmakers have questioned to what extent security requests were ignored before the attack, whether the military could have done more to respond the night of the attack and whether talking points were intentionally changed for political reasons after the attack to downplay terrorism. The witnesses could address all three areas on Wednesday. 

Issa claimed one "cover-up" is "undeniable" -- that the State Department botched security in Benghazi in the run-up to the attack. But, he said, "it still doesn't explain the president misleading the American people over a period of weeks." 

The Weekly Standard reported last week that the initial CIA talking points on the attack said "Islamic extremists with ties to al Qaeda participated in the attack." The reference to Al Qaeda was later taken out, and the initial reference to "attacks" was reportedly changed to "demonstrations." 

According to The Weekly Standard, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland raised "serious concerns" at the time about the draft, concerned it could fuel criticism of the department. 

The language continued to be watered down. 

Issa told Fox News, in reference to the revisions, that "it's very clear ... that this was a political change." 

Hicks, according to a transcript, also told congressional investigators that he thought it "was a terrorist attack from the get go." 

The whistle-blowers will be able to provide a new perspective on what was happening on the ground that night.   

Hicks, according to transcripts, told investigators that the U.S. military could have prevented one wave of the deadly attack on American personnel in Benghazi if fighter jets had been promptly deployed. Further, he claimed that a second rescue team that was supposed to go from Tripoli to Benghazi early the next morning was told not to go. 

He said Special Forces personnel were planning to board a C-130 flight at around 6 a.m. local time on Sept. 12 but got a phone call when they were on their way to the flight telling them "you can't go now, you don't have authority to go now. And so they missed the flight." 

He added: "They were told not to board the flight, so they missed it," apparently because they did not have the "right authority." 

Thompson has also claimed that Clinton and a key aide effectively tried to cut the department's own counterterrorism bureau out of the loop that night.   

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney denied the claim on Monday. 

Daniel Benjamin, who ran the department's Counterterrorism Bureau at the time, also put out a statement Monday morning strongly denying the charges. 

"I ran the bureau then, and I can say now with certainty, as the former Coordinator for Counterterrorism, that this charge is simply untrue," he said. "Though I was out of the country on official travel at the time of the attack, I was in frequent contact with the Department. At no time did I feel that the Bureau was in any way being left out of deliberations that it should have been part of."

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BENGHAZI BACKLASH: Report: Clinton Tried to Cut Anti-Terror Unit Out of Loop

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On the night of Sept. 11, as the Obama administration scrambled to respond to the Benghazi terror attacks, then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and a key aide effectively tried to cut the department's own counterterrorism bureau out of the chain of reporting and decision-making, according to a "whistle-blower" witness from that bureau who will soon testify to the charge before Congress, Fox News has learned.

That witness is Mark I. Thompson, a former Marine and now the deputy coordinator for operations in the agency’s counterterrorism bureau. Sources tell Fox News Thompson will level the allegation against Clinton during testimony on Wednesday before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, chaired by Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif.

Fox News has also learned that another official from the counterterrorism bureau -- independently of Thompson -- voiced the same complaint about Clinton and Under Secretary for Management Patrick Kennedy to trusted national security colleagues back in October.

Extremists linked to Al Qaeda stormed the American consulate and a nearby annex on Sept. 11, in a heavily armed and well-coordinated eight-hour assault that killed the U.S. ambassador to Libya, Chris Stevens, and three other Americans.

Thompson considers himself a whistle-blower whose account was suppressed by the official investigative panel that Clinton convened to review the episode, the Accountability Review Board (ARB). Thompson's lawyer, Joseph diGenova, a former U.S. attorney, has further alleged that his client has been subjected to threats and intimidation by as-yet-unnamed superiors at State, in advance of his cooperation with Congress.

Sources close to the congressional investigation who have been briefed on what Thompson will testify tell Fox News the veteran counterterrorism official concluded on Sept. 11 that Clinton and Kennedy tried to cut the counterterrorism bureau out of the loop as they and other Obama administration officials weighed how to respond to -- and characterize -- the Benghazi attacks.

"You should have seen what (Clinton) tried to do to us that night," the second official in State's counterterrorism bureau told colleagues back in October.  Those comments would appear to be corroborated by Thompson's forthcoming testimony.

State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki called the counterterrorism officials' allegation "100 percent false." A spokesman for Clinton said tersely that the charge is not true.

Thompson's attorney, diGenova, would not comment for this article.

Documents from the State Department, the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Council, first published in the May 13 edition of "The Weekly Standard," showed that senior officials from those agencies decided within days of the attacks to delete all references to Al Qaeda's known involvement in them from "talking points" being prepared for those administration officers being sent out to discuss the attacks publicly.

Those talking points -- and indeed, the statements of all senior Obama administration officials who commented publicly on Benghazi during the early days after the attacks -- sought instead to depict the Americans' deaths as the result of a spontaneous protest that went awry. The administration later acknowledged that there had been no such protest, as evidence mounted that Al Qaeda-linked terrorists had participated in the attacks. The latter conclusion had figured prominently in the earliest CIA drafts of the talking points, but was stricken by an ad hoc group of senior officials controlling the drafting process. Among those involved in prodding the deletions, the documents published by "The Weekly Standard" show, was State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland, who wrote at one point that the revisions were not sufficient to satisfy "my building's leadership."

The allegations of the two counterterrorism officials stand to return the former secretary of state to the center of the Benghazi story. Widely regarded as a leading potential candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016, Clinton has insisted she was not privy to decisions made by underlings about the inadequate security for the U.S. installations in Benghazi that were made in the run-up to the attacks. And she has portrayed her role -- once the attacks became known in Washington -- as that of a determined fact-finder who worked with colleagues to fashion the best possible response to the crisis.

Clinton testified about Benghazi for the first and only time in January of this year, shortly before leaving office. She had long delayed her testimony, at first because she cited the need for the ARB to complete its report, and then because she suffered a series of untimely health problems that included a stomach virus, a concussion sustained during a fall at home, and a blood clot near her brain, from which she has since recovered. However, Clinton was never interviewed by the ARB she convened.

Fox News disclosed last week that the conduct of the ARB is itself now under review by the State Department's Office of Inspector General. A department spokesman said the OIG probe is examining all prior ARBs, not just the one established after Benghazi.

The counterterrorism officials, however, concluded that Clinton and Kennedy were immediately wary of the attacks being portrayed as acts of terrorism, and accordingly worked to prevent the counterterrorism bureau from having a role in the department's early decision-making relating to them.

Also appearing before the oversight committee on Wednesday will be Gregory N. Hicks, the deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Libya at the time of the Benghazi terrorist attacks. Like Thompson, Hicks is a career State Department official who considers himself a Benghazi whistle-blower. His attorney, Victoria Toensing, a former chief counsel to the Senate Intelligence Committee, has charged that Hicks, too, has faced threats of reprisal from unnamed superiors at State. (Toensing and diGenova, who are representing their respective clients pro bono, are married.)

Portions of the forthcoming testimony of Hicks -- who was one of the last people to speak to Stevens, and who upon the ambassador's death became the senior U.S. diplomat in Libya -- were made public by Rep. Issa during an appearance on the CBS News program "Face the Nation" on Sunday.

Hicks told the committee that he and his colleagues on the ground in Libya that night knew instantly that Benghazi was a terrorist attack, and that he was astonished that no one drafting the administration's talking points consulted with him before finalizing them, or before U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice delivered them on the Sunday talk shows of Sept. 16.

Hicks was interviewed by the ARB but Thompson was not, sources close to the committee's investigation tell Fox News.

James Rosen,

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Dems Now Slam Rice's Benghazi Account, Amid New Damaging Details

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Congressional Democrats on Sunday distanced themselves from the Obama administration’s explanation of the Benghazi, Libya, attacks in the immediate aftermath of the fatal strikes, amid mounting evidence that suggests the information was revised to intentionally mislead Americans.

The original explanation of the Sept. 11, 2012, attacks on the U.S. outpost in Benghazi, Libya, was written by CIA officials, then revised by State Department and White House officials, according to news reports and witness testimony made available to Fox News.

Removed from the CIA's so-called talking points were references to “Islamic extremists” and Al Qaeda in Libya And five days later, Susan Rice, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, made the Sunday talk show rounds to say the attacks were, in fact, “demonstrations” sparked by protests in Egypt over an anti-Islamic video on YouTube.

However, the video is never mentioned in the numerous talking-points drafts, according to a Weekly Standard story last week, based in part on a 43-page House report and records of official emails.

“Well, it was scrubbed,” Massachusetts Democratic Rep. Steve Lynch told “Fox News Sunday.” “It was totally inaccurate. There's no excuse for that. It was false information.  And what they try to do is harmonize what happened in Benghazi with what happened everywhere else across the Middle East.”

Lynch also acknowledged the talking points were likely revised to reflect President Obama’s decry – with his re-election bid in the balance -- that “Al Qaeda is on the run.”

Maryland Democratic Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, also acknowledged Sunday the facts as told by Rice were wrong.

“At the time, as it turns out” the information was incorrect, he said on CBS’ “Face the Nation”

Ruppersberger, who was briefed by the CIA about the attacks in immediate aftermath, asked agency officials what congressional leaders could tell the public, according to The Weekly Standard story.

On Sunday, he also said he welcomes a House Oversight and Government Affairs Committee hearing this week in which Greg Hicks, the deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Libya at the time of attacks, is expected to say Rice said the attacks didn’t appear to be “pre-meditated or pre-planned,” despite having information suggesting they were.

“That's what an investigation is about,” Ruppersberger told CBS. “Let's get the facts.”

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FOX NEWS POLL: Voters take North Korea seriously- FOX NEWS POLL: Obama should have been more involved with Benghazi

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  April 23, 2013: A propaganda billboard, which reads "Forward to the Ultimate Victory" in Korean stands in central Kaesong, North Korea. For weeks, North Korea has threatened to attack the U.S. and South Korea for holding joint military drills and for supporting U.N. sanctions. Washington and Seoul said they've seen no evidence that Pyongyang is actually preparing for a major conflict, though South Korean defense officials said the North appears prepared to test-fire a medium-range missile.AP

American voters have divided views about whether North Korea has missiles that could hit the United States, yet most think threats from the country’s leader Kim Jong Un should be taken seriously, according to a new Fox News poll.

Some 48 percent of voters think North Korea has the ability to hit the U.S. with a nuclear missile.  Nearly as many -- 42 percent -- don’t think so.

CLICK TO VIEW THE FOX NEWS POLL

Political affiliation does not play a role:  Roughly equal numbers of Democrats (51 percent) and Republicans (49 percent) think it’s possible that the U.S. faces a real North Korean nuclear threat.

There’s more consensus among voters on the instability of Kim Jong Un:  74 percent think he’s “crazy” and his threats should be taken seriously.  One voter in five (20 percent), thinks the young leader is just trying to prove himself and his threats are empty.

North Korea has recently been threatening to conduct a missile test, and it has also declared a “state of war” with South Korea.  The United States has responded by moving military resources into the region and President Obama has condemned the North Korean regime’s behavior.

By a 45-36 percent margin, voters approve of the job Obama is doing on North Korea, one of his highest current ratings.  Nineteen percent are unsure.

The president’s job performance ratings are only higher in one area: Terrorism.  On that, voters approve by 55-37 percent.  

On the other issues tested in the poll -- the economy, immigration, gun control and the federal deficit -- the president receives negative job ratings.  

Despite the North Korean threat, foreign policy comes in last when voters are asked about the most important issue facing the country.  Just one percent thinks it should be the top priority.  The economy dwarfs all other issues to top the list (42 percent).  Next is the federal budget deficit (17 percent), followed by terrorism (9 percent), health care (7 percent), guns (5 percent), Social Security (5 percent) and immigration (4 percent).

The Fox News poll is based on landline and cell phone interviews with 1,009 randomly chosen registered voters nationwide and was conducted under the joint direction of Anderson Robbins Research (D) and Shaw & Company Research (R) from April 20 to April 22.  The full poll has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points.
 

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Fox News Poll: Voters Say Take Kim Jong Un Seriously

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Kerry vows Benghazi liaison to Congress within 24 hours, amid lingering questions

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  FILE: Feb. 14, 2013: Secretary of State John Kerry speaks at the State Department in Washington, D.C.AP

Secretary of State John Kerry said Wednesday he will appoint a special department liaison to help Congress with unanswered questions about the 2012 fatal terror attacks on a United States outpost in Libya.

Kerry said the appointment will be made as early as Thursday, following repeated questions about the incident, during a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing.

“I’ll appoint somebody tomorrow,” Kerry said.

Kerry’s remark followed sharp comments from California Republican Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, who suggested the Obama administration has lied to congressional investigators.

“Nobody has lied to anybody,” responded Kerry, who became the country's top diplomat after the attacks. 

Congressional Republicans have led efforts since the Sept. 11, 2012, attacks in Benghazi, Libya, in which four Americans were killed, to learn more about what preceded the incident and the aftermath.

There have been no arrests in direct connection to the killings.

However, Kerry said Wednesday that officials are working with the Libyan government and “building a case.”

At the start of the hearing, Kerry testified that officials involved in the Benghazi issue already testified eight times before Congress, briefed congressional leaders roughly 20 times and submitted about 25,000 pages of related documents.

However, committee Chairman Ed Royce suggested the administration might be “attempting to stonewall the progress.” He said congressional staffers are being monitored as they sift through the declassified information and that the documents cannot be photocopied.

Kerry said he was not aware of the situation.

“If you have additional questions or some documents you think you need, I’ll work with you,” he said.

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GOP Leaders Meet on Benghazi, Vow Coordinated Inquiry Into Attack

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House Speaker John Boehner convened a special meeting on the Benghazi, Libya, terrorist attack Thursday, bringing in the chairmen of the House Intelligence, Foreign Affairs and Government Oversight committees, as well as Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, John McCain of Arizona and Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, Fox News has learned.

While the three House Committees are conducting independent investigations of the deadly Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Government Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa, Foreign Affairs Chairman Ed Royce and Intelligence Chairman Mike Rogers agreed to now pool their findings in a single report that should be complete in "weeks not months."

"There were some members who wanted to have a conversation to kind of compare notes on what we know and what we don't know. And frankly, there's a lot that we still don't know," Boehner said. "It was a friendly exchange of information and some decisions about a way forward."

After the meeting, Rogers, R-Mich., told Fox News the members are taking a fact-based approach, and in the process, they are finding "anomalies" that still need to be addressed more than six months after the attack, in which Ambassador Chris Stevens and there other Americans were killed.

"We want to make sure that we have a full story of what happened, and where there are conflicting stories, we are going to work to de-conflict them," Rogers said. "I think the report will shed light on those decisions, including senior leadership that may have been involved or may not have been involved."

Asked if questions remained about President Obama's involvement in the U.S. response on the night of the Benghazi attack, Rogers responded, "or lack of involvement that evening."

The ranking Democratic member of the House Intelligence Committee, Dutch Ruppersburger, was not at the Thursday meeting, but he told Fox he has no problem with Republican efforts to dig into the Benghazi terrorist attack to fulfill their oversight responsibility.

"Let's get over the politics. There are many issues that we are dealing with. And bring closure to this, but if we don't have all the evidence then we need to continue to look at it," Ruppersburger said.

With gaps in the timeline, lawmakers say they want to question the survivors, as well as government employees and contractors in the military and intelligence community.

"There are people who are there, there are people who are decision makers in the intelligence community, in the State Department, in the Department of Defense, and there are people who still want to communicate things. And we want to make sure all those folks have an opportunity to have that discussion," Rogers said.

In recent letters to the State Department and CIA, Ayotte, McCain and Graham asked for the Benghazi survivors to be made available for congressional investigators to question. Graham told Fox News, in an interview with Bret Baier, that he'd spoken to survivors who claimed they had been told not to talk.

"I've had contact with some of the survivors. Their story is chilling. They feel afraid to tell it. It's important they come forward to tell their story," Graham said. "Some are back working for the government. Some are still injured. The bottom line is they feel that they can't come forth. They've been told to be quiet."

The State Department has been non-committal about making its employees and contractors who were in Benghazi available to investigators. An agency spokesperson said in a statement, “The CIA respects requests from Congress and we will provide a response through the appropriate oversight committees.”

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Silenced? Senator Claims SurvivorsOf Benghazi Attack Told to 'Be Quiet'

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Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, in an interview with Fox News, alleged that the injured survivors of the Benghazi terror attack have been "told to be quiet" and feel they can't come forward to tell their stories -- escalating his push for more information about survivors who have never been publicly identified. 

The White House is denying any attempt to exert pressure on them. 

"I'm sure that the White House is not preventing anyone from speaking," White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said, when asked about the survivors. 

But Graham told Fox News that "the bottom line is they feel that they can't come forth, they've been told to be quiet." 

"We cannot let this administration or any other administration get away with hiding from the American people and Congress, people who were there in real time to tell the story," Graham said. 

Watch the full interview with Sen. Graham on Fox News' "Special Report with Bret Baier" at 6 p.m. ET. 

Graham continued to voice concern about the inaccurate or incomplete accounts that came from the Obama administration in the days following the attack. He is among a handful of Republican lawmakers pressing for access to and more information about the survivors. 

A congressional source tells Fox News that Hill staffers investigating the attack believe about 37 personnel were in Benghazi on behalf of the State Department and CIA on Sept. 11. With the deaths of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three others, about 33 people were evacuated. Of them, a State Department official confirmed there were three diplomatic security agents and one contractor who were injured in the assault - one seriously. 

A diplomatic security source told Fox News the State Department diplomatic security agent who was in the most serious condition suffered a severe head injury during the second wave of the attack at the annex. 

This agent was described as the likely State Department employee visited at Walter Reed Medical Center by Secretary of State John Kerry in January. 

While not denying the details, the State Department official offered no comment on the nature of the injuries or whether the agent was visited by Kerry or Hillary Clinton before she left office. 

Leading Republicans in the Senate and House have been calling on the State Department to identify the injured and make them available to congressional investigators. So far, they say their calls have gone unanswered. 

Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, said the administration has provided "zero" documents on the matter and has not provided names of those attacked. 

Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va., has gathered about 60 signatures in support of a select committee to investigate the Benghazi terrorist attack. Wolf has said the committee is the most thorough and efficient approach to resolving the lingering underlying questions rather than the competing and overlapping committee jurisdictions. 

Wolf, along with Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif., and leading Senate Republicans Graham, John McCain of Arizona, and Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire have pressed the State Department for answers. 

Rohrabacher, R-Calif., on Friday said the administration is "covering up something." 

Fox News' Bret Baier and Catherine Herridge contributed to this report.

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