After Four Years And Multiple Investigations, Fox News' Megyn Kelly Relitigates Benghazi

Kelly: “Somehow The Clinton Supporters Have Managed To Turn This Into ‘You're A Conspiratorial Hater If You Want To Talk About Benghazi.’”

Written by Media Matters Staff

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Fox Host Megyn Kelly invited former Deputy Chief of Mission in Libya Greg Hicks on her program to attack Hillary Clinton's handling of the 2012 terrorist attacks in Benghazi. Kelly’s attacks ignored the multiple bipartisan Congressional investigations that have routinely failed to find any evidence of wrongdoing.



The Benghazi hoax cooked up by Fox News was debunked by an investigation by the House Select Committee, a review by the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and an independent report by the State Department Accountability Review Board (ARB). Although official reports discredited the network’s whirlwind of Benghazi misinformation, Fox News figures continue to cite Benghazi to attack Clinton on air. From the September 13 edition of Fox News’ The Kelly File:

MEGYN KELLY (HOST): Tonight for the first time as a private citizen, the last person to speak to Ambassador [Chris] Stephens is speaking out. Gregory Hicks was Ambassador Stephens's number-two guy. He first went public in 2013 in explosive congressional testimony, claiming desperate pleas for security in Benghazi fell on deaf ears in Ms. Clinton's State Department.

He joins us tonight. Greg Hicks is the former deputy chief of mission for Libya who just retired after a distinguished 25-year career. Greg, thank you so much for being here. Wo what you have come out to say is that Mrs. Clinton cannot be trusted, in your words, with the security of the nation. Why? 

GREG HICKS: Well, it's important that we look at the Benghazi experience in that exact context. Mrs. Clinton delegated her legal security obligations to others, those obligations to protect official Americans overseas and especially in Benghazi. The law says that responsibility rests with the Secretary of State. And what happened is that our security compliment in Tripoli was reduced from 34 to six, so that when Chris Stephens went to Benghazi we could only let him take two security officers with him instead of the dozen or more that he should have had. The results are well known. The second issue --

KELLY: She claims -- Now, Mrs. Clinton claims that she gave very direct instructions, to people who have expertise in security, to make sure that everything was secure. 

HICKS: Well, that's right. And you're making the point that I made, that she delegated those responsibilities and that she didn't pay attention afterwards. And consequently, she must bear the responsibility for those outcomes. In addition she delegated the decision to divide our personnel in Benghazi between two facilities. And that decision cannot be delegated, according to the law. And so we had --

KELLY: But I think one of the things that gets lost is that this was a time when the facility that you were at in Benghazi, Libya -- there had been two bomb attacks on the consulate in the prior six months. The British and the Red Cross had both pulled out of Benghazi over security concerns. Ambassador Chris Stephens had been begging for additional security, which she did not provide. 

HICKS: Correct. 

KELLY: And somehow the Clinton supporters have managed to turn this into “you're a conspiratorial hater if you want to talk about Benghazi.”

HICKS: And her spinmeisters are very good at this, but the truth is she and her delegated authorities took our security away, and as the report by the majority of the Benghazi committee indicated, there were no military forces standing by to come and rescue us if something happened. 

KELLY: So you're not going to vote for Mrs. Clinton. Are you a Republican? I mean, are you a partisan guy? 

HICKS: I have been a professional diplomat for many years. I have voted for the person that I think is the best candidate and I will not vote for Mrs. Clinton because I don't think she's the best candidate.