In book, Clinton defends response to Benghazi attack

Associated Press

WASHINGTON

Hillary Rodham Clinton dismisses her critics and defends her handling of the deadly 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya, in her new book, offering fellow Democrats a guide for how to talk about the fraught issue through the 2016 presidential race.

The former secretary of state’s “Hard Choices” is a rebuke to Republicans who have seized upon the Sept. 11, 2012, terrorist attack that killed U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans.

Should Clinton run for president in 2016, her four years as secretary of state and the Benghazi attack in particular are certain to be the subject of driving criticism from Republicans. She’s already trying to blunt the issue.

Republicans have accused the Obama administration of stonewalling congressional investigators and misleading the public about the nature of the attack in the weeks before the presidential election. Republicans used the attack to try to undermine President Barack Obama’s re-election and, now, to tarnish the still-uncertain Clinton bid to replace him in early 2017.

“Those who exploit this tragedy over and over as a political tool minimize the sacrifice of those who served our country,” Clinton writes in a 34-page chapter, obtained by Politico.

Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill said that “until the book is released, there’s nothing to say. And once it’s released, it will speak for itself.” The book comes out June 10.

The former first lady and senator from New York is the leading potential Democratic presidential candidate if she decides to run again, as well as a favorite Republican target.

Clinton writes that she takes responsibility for the deaths, but adds that there has been “a regrettable amount of misinformation, speculation and flat-out deceit” by some in politics and the media.