Congressional staffers had asked for an update following the administration’s claims that Iran threatened U.S. embassies.
The State Department abruptly canceled a classified congressional briefing Wednesday that was supposed to focus on embassy security, a House aide said, infuriating Capitol Hill staffers seeking answers on alleged Iranian threats to U.S. missions overseas.
The cancellation also coincides with documents suggesting that associates of President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani put the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine under surveillance.
“Staff are furious,” the House aide said. “This briefing is required by law every month, and today’s was the most important we’ve had scheduled in a long time. The State Department has given us no explanation whatsoever.”
The canceled briefing on embassy security was originally going to focus on the situation in the African country of Burundi. But at congressional staff’s request, the topic was broadened to cover embassy security in the wake of the U.S. drone strike that killed Iranian general Qassem Soleimani earlier this month.
…….
Congressional staffers had planned to ask questions about the shifting explanations and wanted to receive a global threat assessment for U.S. personnel. The State Department agreed to provide the briefing, then said Tuesday that it would not do so, the House aide said.
……..
On Tuesday, House Democrats released additional information they’d recently obtained from Lev Parnas, who worked closely with Giuliani on his efforts to dig up damaging information on former vice president Joe Biden in Ukraine.
Some of the material, including text messages, indicated that Republican congressional candidate Robert Hyde was working with Parnas to surveil Marie Yovanovitch, the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine at the time. It’s not clear whether Giuliani was aware of Hyde’s activities, and Hyde told reporters yesterday that he was just making idle talk.
At Trump’s insistence, Pompeo recalled Yovanovitch from Ukraine in May as Giuliani circulated unsubstantiated reports claiming the veteran ambassador was acting corruptly.
The president described Yovanovitch as “bad news” in a July 25 phone call with Ukraine’s president, saying said she was “going to go through some things.”
Yovanovitch testified in Trump’s impeachment inquiry last year, and said that she felt frightened when she read the rough transcript of Trump’s call.
…….
The revelations has also troubled serving and former U.S. diplomats, some of whom were demanding to know what the State Department’s diplomatic security division did to protect Yovanovitch, and what, if anything, Pompeo knew about it.
- Discussion
-
The State Department abruptly canceled a classified congressional briefing today that was supposed to focus on embassy security https://t.co/0wGIYxVoHC
— POLITICO (@politico) January 15, 2020
You must be logged in to reply to this topic.