Emily Schillinger, a spokeswoman for Boehner, said in response to the ad: “This is a classic Clinton attempt to distract from her record of putting classified information at risk and jeopardizing our national security, all of which the FBI is investigating”.
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Gowdy dismissed the claim, saying Podliska has “run to the press with his new salacious allegations” after failing to get money from the committee, according to Fox News.
The former staffer, who is seeking compensation for lost wages in a suit against the committee, charged that the panel “had become a partisan investigation” and that he didn’t understand “the reason for the hyper-focus on Hillary Clinton”.
“The families of the Americans who died in the Benghazi attacks deserve to find out the truth about Benghazi, but to do that a thorough, non-partisan investigation must be conducted of all agencies and officials involved in Benghazi”, the former committee aide added. He said he was sacked for refusing to go along with the new direction of the committee’s work, as well as for taking leave to meet his military service requirements.
By contrast, the Clinton campaign, which has been plagued by the still-unresolved Benghazi scandal and Clinton’s own infamous “what difference does it make” statement, was quick to seize on Podliska’s claims as potential “proof” that the Benghazi probe was, in fact, a partisan witch-hunt from the start.
Podliska told CNN he does not support Clinton and will support whoever wins the GOP nomination.
Filing from Las Vegas on the eve of the first 2016 Democratic presidential debate, Clinton correspondent and MSNBC host Andrea Mitchell expressed relief that “Hillary Clinton got a potential lifeline” following “months of being pounded by the Republican-led Benghazi Committee.” .
Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) said Bradley Podliska did not mention Clinton in his formal complaint after he was sacked, and never provided evidence to prove that he was instructed to focus on Clinton.
In a statement released Sunday, Gowdy ripped into CNN for airing Podliska’s “sensationalistic and fabulist claims” without probing deeper. All the committee would care about is getting a look at the emails from her private server-which is now happening. A former staff member for the committee investigating the attack is claiming the investigation improperly targeted Clinton. Since March, 24 of the 31 press releases the committee issued have focused on Clinton.
“Aside from the deliberate falsity of those characterizations”, the letter continues, “both you and your clients know that the public disclosures made by Chairman Gowdy and the Benghazi Committee clearly violate both the Congressional Accountability Act and the Mediation and Confidentiality Agreement that you both signed”.
The committee called the allegation “yet another false, unsubstantiated claim” in a statement to CNN and suggested the incidents Podliska was referring to had to do with a PowerPoint presentation that a committee spokesperson previously called a “hit piece on members of the Obama administration – including Secretary Clinton”.
Former investigator with the committee, Todd Podliska, announced his plans Sunday afternoon to file a lawsuit.
Podliska was sacked after 10 months on the committee. Only days after McCarthy’s assertion that the committee had succeeded in driving down her poll numbers, her campaign had a TV spot attacking it. Less than a week later, 225 Republicans voted to create the committee, with only seven Democrats signing on.
Podliska, now stationed in Germany, could not be reached for comment.
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Perhaps this would have happened even if House Majority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) hadn’t admitted two weeks ago what everyone already knew, that the driving objective of the select committee was to harm Hillary Clinton’s political prospects.
