'Somebody's lying. Who is it?" Interview with Hillary Clinton About Benghazi — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:00I'm Tom Mclofflin and this is a
2. 0:02five-minute segment of an interview with
3. 0:05Hillary Clinton in which I was able to
4. 0:07question her about Benghazi. I was part
5. 0:10of an editorial board which questioned
6. 0:12her for an hour on Wednesday, December
7. 0:1429th, 2015 at the Conway Daily Sun
8. 0:17offices in North Conway, New Hampshire.
9. 0:20As this podcast begins, Secretary
10. 0:22Clinton is finishing up her answer to
11. 0:24the publisher Mark Garang who also
12. 0:26addressed Benghazi. Then I interject.
13. 0:31None of which is of any interest. Their
14. 0:34whole purpose is to somehow derail me,
15. 0:37which I I understand it's a it's nothing
16. 0:41but politics to them, but it's not just
17. 0:42politics to me. I have a specific
18. 0:45question about that if I could. the um
19. 0:48but you mentioned the families, the
20. 0:51Benghazi victims and you know the
21. 0:54discrepancy Mark brought up about you
22. 0:56you the email to or a conversation maybe
23. 0:58to your daughter about it being
24. 1:02um an al-Qaedaike group an alia then you
25. 1:06told an Egyptian diplomat in a phone
26. 1:08conversation that it was a planned
27. 1:10attack and not a protest. Um but then uh
28. 1:15when you went when when the boys were
29. 1:16brought back, you you spoke to the
30. 1:19family members and you told you told and
31. 1:21they say you told them that this was a
32. 1:24spontaneous
33. 1:26demonstration and then on uh George
34. 1:29Stephanopoulos asked on on this week
35. 1:33um did you tell them it was about the
36. 1:35film and you said
37. 1:38no. Now somebody's lying. Well, first
38. 1:41let me say Well, not me. That's all I
39. 1:44can tell you. But, you know, people were
40. 1:45incredibly emotionally distraught. Let
41. 1:48Let's give everybody a little bit of
42. 1:51breathing room here and recognize
43. 1:55that
44. 1:57there. I mean, I I'm trying to remember
45. 2:00what's in the public record and what
46. 2:01isn't. Let's just say that some of the
47. 2:03families didn't even know that their
48. 2:07sons were working for the CIA and were
49. 2:10in Benghazi. This was a huge
50. 2:15emotional blow and I'm very sympathetic
51. 2:19to that. I can only tell you what the
52. 2:21facts were. That period when I talked to
53. 2:24the Egyptian prime minister was in that
54. 2:27bubble when we thought there was a
55. 2:29terrorist group taking credit for it and
56. 2:32that's what we said. And then when they
57. 2:34withdrew and when the intelligence
58. 2:35community led by the CIA basically said
59. 2:38we don't know yet because remember the
60. 2:40CIA and the intel community was guiding
61. 2:44us about what they thought happened and
62. 2:47we had to rely on that. We didn't have
63. 2:49any
64. 2:50independent information or verification.
65. 2:53All this material was coming in. The CIA
66. 2:56was sorting it out. And if you look at
67. 2:58the reports that were done uh by the
68. 3:01minority on the Benghazi committee,
69. 3:03because it's a much more reliable source
70. 3:05than the Republican majority, they go
71. 3:08through chapter and verse timing about
72. 3:11what happened when. And the bottom line
73. 3:13is what happened is people were doing
74. 3:16the best they could dealing with
75. 3:17information that was changing. And the
76. 3:19CIA wrote and approved the talking
77. 3:22points that were used. Uh and it was
78. 3:25also true that from Egypt to Tunisia
79. 3:30uh to Pakistan, the video was the
80. 3:34primary spark that was sending people
81. 3:37into protesting against our facilities.
82. 3:40All of this was happening
83. 3:41simultaneously. It wasn't either or. As
84. 3:44much as people want to get to the bottom
85. 3:46of it, it was an amalgam of information
86. 3:49and action. I'm sure those people were
87. 3:51distraught. Yes. three different people.
88. 3:54Tyrone Wood's father said about you you
89. 3:58that you told him quote we're going to
90. 4:00have a filmmaker arrested who was
91. 4:03responsible for the death of your son.
92. 4:05Sean Smith's mother reported she said
93. 4:07that it was because of the video and and
94. 4:10then Glenn Dy's sister said that you
95. 4:12chose to quote in that moment to
96. 4:14basically perpetuate what you knew was
97. 4:16untrue. So, all three of them say you
98. 4:19told them that and you say you didn't
99. 4:21tell them that. I can only tell you what
100. 4:24I know happened. I can't I can't speak
101. 4:27to them. I can tell you what Chris
102. 4:29Stevens family believes. I can tell you
103. 4:31what Sean Smith's wife believes. I can
104. 4:33tell you what other family members
105. 4:34believe because Yes. But you didn't tell
106. 4:36them that. I did not tell them that. But
107. 4:39I can't recite for you everything that
108. 4:41was in a conversation where people were
109. 4:43sobbing, where people were distraught,
110. 4:47where groups of us, the president, the
111. 4:49vice president, we were all making the
112. 4:51rounds, talking to people, listening to
113. 4:54people, and I was in a very difficult
114. 4:57position because we had not yet said
115. 4:59that two of the four dead were CIA
116. 5:02because we were under very strict
117. 5:05um direction from the CIA.
118. 5:08not to reveal that yet. So this was this
119. 5:11was again part of the fog of war and you
120. 5:14know I regret that
121. 5:17anybody has a you know an attitude a
122. 5:22feeling that I do not
123. 5:25think is accurate. But I'm not going to
124. 5:28do anything other than express my
125. 5:30sympathy for them because I think they
126. 5:32deserve it. They were people who lost
127. 5:34their children and they have every right
128. 5:37to believe whatever they want to
129. 5:38believe, but the facts don't bear it
130. 5:41out.
131. 5:42I let her go at this point, not because
132. 5:44I wanted to, but I would like to have
133. 5:47pursued what she said about the CIA
134. 5:49writing the talking points, which wasn't
135. 5:51true. Uh, but I was part of a team and
136. 5:54others were waiting to ask their
137. 5:56questions and we had a limited amount of
138. 5:58time, so I just uh I stopped it there.