Top Democrat threatens to subpoena Biden officials as Blinken testifies on Afghanistan

[Calista241]

Source: Axios

Secretary of State Antony Blinken is testifying Tuesday before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, where he'll face a second day of interrogation from Republican lawmakers highly critical of the Biden administration's withdrawal from Afghanistan.

The latest: The committee's chair, hawkish New Jersey Democrat Bob Menendez, pulled no punches in his opening statement, threatening to subpoena Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and other Biden officials who decline to voluntarily appear before the committee.

Mr. Secretary, the execution of the U.S. withdrawal was clearly and fatally flawed," Menendez told Blinken.

Menendez promised accountability for the multiple administrations who "lied" about the stability of the Afghan government, and she aid Austin's refusal to testify "will affect my personal judgment on Department of Defense nominees."

Read more: https://www.axios.com/blinken-senate-testimony-afghanistan-f49c16e1-7093-49ab-8c47-af4e9dee8789.html

[turbinetree]

1. Bring in George W Bush and "Dick I am Cheney"

and if Rumsfeld was still alive that POS , start there...........JFC

[Walleye]

2. Subpoena Pompeo, if you're serious.

[JohnSJ]

3. I am sure glad such a stand-up guy like Bob Menendez who has no ethical challenges is leading

this effort



Remeber in 2006 when Menendez steered federal funds to a nonprofit group that was paying him rent, or in 2014 when he intervened on behalf of two accused Ecuadorian criminals in exchange for campaign donations, or in 2017 when he was accused of helping an affluent eye doctor in exchange of gifts of nearly 1 million dollars?

While I don't have a problem with a fact finding mission in the Senate foreign relations committee what happened with the Afghanistan withdrawal event, and what went wrong, I do have a problem with what happened to Secretary of State Blinken, and his treatment among some of the members of Congress, whose intent was NOT to understand what went wrong, and ask relevant questions, but instead use as an opportunity to not give Blinken a chance to answer questions, name calling with some of the most vile insinuations, and just to make political speeches.

[brer cat]

11. Exactly, John.

I hope Menendez's constituents are paying attention. He should not have jumped on the bandwagon to bash the Biden Administration.

[onetexan]

4. Who the heck is this guy wanting to do Blinken in? Yet another

Example of Dems eating our own.

[JohnSJ]

7. If it was a true fact finding mission that would be one thing, but as the other day demonstrated

it was nothing of the sort

The disrespect and vile comments coming from some republicans who wouldn't even give the Secretary of State a chance to answer questions was disgraceful, and Menendez did very little to stop that circus

[onetexan]

12. Menendez sounds like a jackass

[riversedge]

14. I watched some of it yesterday, The #Republicans were disrespectual and horrible

[no_hypocrisy]

5. Hey Bob! Don't forget to demand top Pentagon brass who endorsed the

pull-out under Trump's terms.

[Botany]

6. While he is at it he can dig up Donny Rumsfeld and ask him why he let bin Laden walk away @ ...

... Tora Bora in late 2001 and early 2002 because after that it was over in Afghanistan for us.

[samnsara]

8. everyone wants joe to defend a random point in time

..'well what if ya withdrew at (fill in the date,time and pick am or pm)'.....the situation was fluid..changing by the hour. NO one could guarantee any different outcome. War is hell on children and other living things.. it was bloody going in and bloody coming out. its w.a.r.

im just damned glad we are out of there

[Bayard]

9. Wait....what?

Were you around during Viet Nam, sir?

No one could have done this any better, and no one could have predicted the Taliban would move as fast. We got out thousands of people.

I'm guessing the latest Dem trying to look bipartisan. He's seen how much attention Manchin gets.

[LiberalFighter]

10. What is wrong with Menendez?

[gab13by13]

13. Bwahaha,

and we can't say anything bad about Menendez here or we will get alerted on.

Why the fuck, is that a nice way of putting a question, are Democrats doing these Afghanistan hearings? They gave a platform to GQPers to bash president Biden, and boy oh boy these hearings didn't take long to happen. When will we see Mark Meadows and others before the select committee? Am I allowed to ask that question?

[BumRushDaShow]

15. Menendez took over that Chair position after Democrats in GA crawled over glass

to get us 2 more Senators from a special election, making it a 50-50 Senate, who along with the VP, gave us a "technical majority" and the opportunity to chair the Senate Committees. That position had originally been Biden's back in 2008 and earlier (when Democrats last had control of the Senate) before he was tapped to run for VP by Obama (as a side note).

And he's also only in his own Senatorial position as it is because he basically begged for support when his seat was in serious jeopardy due to his legal troubles and a wealthy GOP opponent, and managed to be running at the right time to get back in as 2018 became a "wave election" year.