Amid the extensive coverage of Hurricane Sandy and what’s become a second tier story, the presidential election, a few news organizations continue to report on the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi on Sept. 11. On ABCNews.com today, Jake Tapper and a few of his colleagues put together a story about the effort to get answers:
As he left his Marine One helicopter Wednesday evening and walked to the residence of the White House, President Obama did not respond to a question shouted out by ABC News’s Mary Bruce about when he would begin to provide answers to the numerous questions building up about what exactly what went wrong …. The president smiled and continued walking.
Tapper concludes about the Benghazi push-back, “they are deferring detailed answers to the investigation and – critics say – running out the clock until Election Day.”
Fox News’s Jennifer Griffin has covered the story extensively, tonight reporting on a communications breakdown on the night of the attack while Griffin’s FNC colleague Catherine Herridge has gotten her hands on classified cables. And journalists Harald Doornbos and Jenan Moussa, reporting for Foreign Policy, found “several ash-strewn documents beneath rubble in the looted Tactical Operations Center.”
ABC News asked White House press secretary Jay Carney on Air Force One today how closely the President is following the media reports about what went wrong in Benghazi. “Is he engaged in the investigation and receiving updates on the investigation, or is he waiting until it’s complete?” ABC News’ Devin Dwyer asked.
Carney noted that since the “investigations are being conducted by both the FBI and the Accountability Review Board” the president himself “is not participating in the investigation. He is anticipating results that show us exactly what happened, who was responsible and what lessons we can learn from it in terms of how we ensure that it never happens again.”