GOP speakers to focus on Benghazi as convention opens

CLEVELAND (AP) – Republicans are reminding the nation that Hillary Clinton was secretary of state during the deadly 2012 attacks on a diplomatic outpost in Benghazi, Libya, part of a broader focus on national security at the GOP convention.

Pat Smith, the mother of Sean Smith, a State Department employee who was killed in Benghazi, is one of several speakers Monday night tied to the twin attacks on Sept. 11, 2012 that left four Americans dead, including U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens.

Smith will speak as part of the theme, “Make America Safe Again.” She has said Clinton, now the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, lied to her by blaming the assaults on an anti-Muslim video, instead of labeling it a calculated terrorist attack.

U.S. Marine Corps veterans Mark “Oz” Geist and John Tiegen, who fought in Benghazi as part of a security team posted at the CIA annex near the U.S. diplomatic compound, also are scheduled to speak at the convention. Tiegen co-authored the book “13 Hours,” an account of the attacks that later was made into a big-budget movie.

Republicans say the Benghazi attacks were preventable. The GOP blames the Obama administration for lax security at the compound and a slow response to the attacks, which came in waves spread over 13 hours.

Democrats accuse Republicans of exploiting a tragedy for political reasons. They eagerly point to comments by House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy last year suggesting that the House Benghazi committee could take credit for Clinton’s slumping poll numbers.

Republicans hailed a report last month by the GOP majority on the special House committee that spent more than two years and $7 million investigating Benghazi. The GOP report accused the Obama administration of lethal mistakes, but produced no new evidence pointing to wrongdoing by Clinton.

The report outlines “a tragic failure of leadership at the highest levels of the Obama administration and the Clinton State Department and a cynical emphasis on politics over duty,” the Republican National Committee said in a statement. “It’s time to hold Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton accountable for the cover-up.”

Clinton has said the Benghazi report “found nothing to contradict” the findings of multiple earlier investigations into the attacks.

“I think it’s pretty clear it’s time to move on,” she said last month.