Graham to keep holds on Obama nominees
Washington (CNN) - Sen. Lindsey Graham vowed on Sunday that he would continue to block President Barack Obama's nominations until Congress hears from Benghazi survivors.
The South Carolina lawmaker told CNN's Candy Crowley on "State of the Union" that he will place holds on any nomination put forth by the administration unless it makes available five survivors of the September 11, 2012, attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya, who have been interviewed by State Department investigators but remain out of Congress' reach.
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"I've been trying for a year to get these interviews without holds," Graham said.
Graham scoffed at any notion his maneuver amounts to political grandstanding, portraying his actions as a last resort and couching them as part of "trying to perform oversight."
"I don't want to hold anybody. All I want to do is talk to the survivors," Graham insisted. "I'm not trying to prosecute a crime."
Graham announced his intention to hold all of Obama’s nominations the day after CBS's "60 Minutes" aired a controversial report on the attacks. The newsmagazine has since pulled its report, saying that its eyewitness, a British contractor stationed in Libya, lied to reporter Lara Logan about what he saw on the ground.
When pressed by Crowley about whether the debunking of the piece would impact his stance, Graham told her it wouldn’t.
"I never asked for the British contractor. I didn't know he existed," Graham said.
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How concerned was he about Iraq in the Bush era? Gosh, politics is depressing these days,
I'm still waiting for him to find the WMD in Iraq. How many did we lose there Senator? I know you DID YOUR JOB and found out WHY we went in and WHY we lost so many young men and so many were MAIMED FOR LIFE...have you DONE YOUR JOB YET? Or are you just another republican racist? figures....
He is afraid of Tea Party, that is why he is not backing down.. He knows that Tea party candidate will sure defeat him in the primary. This is called POLITICAL STUNT, nothing more than that. If he is true patriot, he should put Bush and Cheney into Prison by now.
Good God Republicans have become the biggest babies ever. Whether Obamacare or Benghazi, if they don't get their way they hold a democracy hostage. Keep it up, idiots, and you can kiss any chance of a majority in the foreseeable future goodbye.
Play to the extreme right; that's the game plan. It doesn't matter that nominees are highly qualified; play to the extreme right because a challenge from the extreme is coming for this pretty boy.
The GOP will hound Clinton with this because it's basically the only thing they remotely have on her. It's going to be a long repetitive three years.
That pony's been ridden all the way to the end of the trail. Time to move on.
How do we know which politicians worm for the war profiteers?
LOL These GOTP crackpots are not going to give up their futile efforts to make Benghazi a political noose for Obama and/or Hillary Clinton. Just sad.
Yeah.... They are going to keep beating this dead horse as long as they still fear Hilary Clinton will run for president...this and Obamacare.
If this had happened under Bush the GOP wouldn't care because Bush is white therefore he is alright in their world.
Scott – this whole "holding back" is a fantasy Graham is pushing to justify his grandstanding obstruction. It's all about Graham trying to get enough points with Teabaggers to keep from having a primary challenge.
This isn't so complicated. The Obama administration is spying on everyone. Probably every one of our embassies is coordinating local spy missions. The CIA got caught in Libya and now they're not going to talk about it and admit what they were doing there.
All he is doing is reminding people how much better Obama handled Libya then the Repubs handled Iraq.
I guess what he wants to hear from the survivors is that since the republican party cut funds to all embassies, they couldn't defend themselves. and most of the dead should still be alive if it wasn't for the fund cuts.
South Carolina receives $1.92 of federal tax dollars for every dollar they send. Maybe we cut some spending in the Palmetto state to reduce the deficit.
Where was this outrage against Bush after 9-11, seems that was a much more major failure than Benghazi. What I really see here is that the Tea Party has the Senator by the balls
Just another jack asinine republican.
When will they ever learn.
No backing down because Benghazi is his key to re-election.
@Scott
Who are they going to subpoena? President Obama? We all know hes simply going to say "I was not there, I only know what was told to me in the reports". The only people who WOULD know what happened have already been subpoenaed or are foreign nationals and therefore can't be subpoenaed.