House Opens New Benghazi Inquiry

The House has voted to establish a new investigation of the deadly assault in Benghazi, with Republicans vowing to dig deeper in a search for truth. Democrats say the election-year inquiry is a political ploy to raise campaign cash and motivate GOP voters, and they're weighing a boycott. As Politico puts it, get ready for a "summer full of hearings about whether the White House bungled the response to the strike." Today's vote to create a select committee for the inquiry was 232-186.

Four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, died in the Sept. 11, 2012, attack on the US diplomatic mission. Republicans accuse the Obama administration of misleading the American people about the nature of the attack during a presidential campaign and stonewalling multiple congressional inquiries. “This obfuscation and refusal to come clean to Congress has left us as well as the people of this country wondering what else is the White House hiding?” said Eric Cantor. Democrat Elijah Cummings, in turn, slammed the investigation as "partisan." (More Benghazi stories.)