Democrats on Wednesday blasted Republicans for sending armed marshals to the home of former Clinton White House aide Sidney Blumenthal to serve as subpoena in its ongoing investigation into the fatal attacks in Benghazi, Libya in 2012.
The subpoena came a day after news reports indicated that presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton was sent information from Blumenthal about the situation in Libya during the civil war that led to the fall of Muammar Qaddafi in 2011. Clinton sent some of that information to aides in the State Department, according to the New York Times.
“These heavy-handed, aggressive, and unnecessary tactics waste the time of the U.S. Marshal service,” said Rep. Elijah Cummings, top Democrat on the House Select Committee on Benghazi. “These latest moves by the Benghazi Committee—issuing a subpoena without first contacting the witness, leaking news of the subpoena before it was served, and not holding any Committee debate or vote—are straight out the partisan playbook of discredited Republican investigations.”
The committee issued a subpoena Tuesday to Blumenthal, a senior adviser to Bill Clinton between 1997 and 2001, a spokesman for the committee confirmed.
Democrats have been complaining for weeks that the committee is taking too long in its investigation and just wants to hurt Clinton's chances in the 2016 presidential election