House Foreign Affairs narrowly votes to hold Blinken in contempt

WASHINGTON — In a narrow party-line vote, the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Tuesday voted to hold Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken in contempt for failing to respond to a subpoena to testify about the Biden administration’s 2021 military withdrawal from Afghanistan.

The vote, 26-25, followed hours of acrimonious debate, with Republicans saying they were upholding the credibility of the committee’s subpoena power and pushing for accountability for the U.S. troops who died in a terrorist attack at the Kabul airport during the last days of the chaotic withdrawal. Democrats said Republicans were acting in bad faith and misusing the subpoena power for political theater.

“Secretary of State Antony Blinken brought this upon himself. I take no joy in this procedure after months of the secretary ignoring countless requests for his testimony,” said Chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, adding he had unsuccessfully sought a personal appearance from Blinken before the committee for four months and had offered him any date in September to testify. “But instead of working with me, Secretary Blinken made false promises and accused me of politicizing this important issue.”

The 29-page contempt report accused Blinken of a “pattern of obstruction throughout the course of this committee’s investigation” into the Afghanistan withdrawal.

Democrats pushed back strongly on McCaul’s narrative and accused him of orchestrating a high-profile contempt vote to embarrass Blinken and President Joe Biden when both men are in New York City this week for the United Nations General Assembly, the biggest annual diplomatic event on the calendar.

Ranking member Gregory W. Meeks said it was a “sad day for this committee” and that Republicans were abusing the committee’s subpoena power “for a political stunt made for Fox News” in the final weeks before the November elections.

The New York Democrat noted Blinken had responded to lawmaker questions about the Afghanistan withdrawal in 14 public hearings since August 2021 and had directed the State Department to provide more than 20,000 pages of documents to the committee, made 15 department officials available for interviews, and also taken the rare step of permitting committee members to read the July 2021 internal “dissent cable” about the withdrawal process.

“There is no obstruction here. That’s cooperation,” Meeks said.

The panel’s vote is likely to be the final House action on the matter before the elections. The House is scheduled to leave Washington on Wednesday after finishing work on a continuing resolution that would fund the government through Dec. 20.

Committee Republicans rejected, 25-26, efforts by Meeks to amend the contempt report with language taking note of committee Democrats’ own findings that the circumstances of the Afghanistan withdrawal were heavily influenced by the Trump administration setting a “time-bound, full withdrawal into motion without regard for facts on the ground” and a failure to plan for the execution of the withdrawal.

“We could call for testimony from former Trump officials who witnesses in our investigation said did not prepare for the looming May 2021 withdrawal date and were uncooperative during President Biden’s transition to office,” Meeks said. “As evidenced by the majority’s investigation and this week’s rushed resolution … Republicans contort themselves at every opportunity to avoid monitoring former President Trump except to revise the historical record about his actions.”

GOP members also rejected, 25-26, another Meeks amendment that would note the extenuating circumstances Blinken is confronting and his offer of “several reasonable alternatives to the dates unilaterally demanded by the committee during which I am carrying out the president’s important foreign policy objectives.”

The secretary has been busy this September conducting shuttle diplomacy in the Middle East where Israel and the militant group Hezbollah are on the precipice of a full-blown war and preparing for and attending UNGA where meetings related to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the humanitarian crisis in Sudan, and the war in Gaza are all on the agenda.

As the dates of the General Assembly have been known for some time, Democrats pointed out that it was unfair for McCaul to expect Blinken to cancel his high-level meetings this week in New York to appear for what they said was more “political theater” from Republicans.

Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., rebuked Democrats for accusing Republicans of playing politics.

“It is damn well not political when 13 U.S. service members died in the bombing at Abbey Gate,” he said, referring to the Islamic State suicide bomber attack outside of Kabul Airport in August 2021. “To my colleagues on the other side, tell the Gold Star families that want answers about this disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, that you believe that their request to hold Secretary Blinken accountable is political.”

Rep. Gerald E. Connolly, D-Va., questioned why Republicans weren’t eager to conduct foreign policy oversight when they led the committee in 2017 and failed to hold hearings into Russian government election interference to benefit former President Donald Trump, or more recently into the events that led up to Palestinian militant group Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel.

The government of Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu, who has strong support from Republicans, has been widely accused of negligence for ignoring readily available intelligence around Hamas’ preparations for the terrorist attack.

“This is in my point of view a deeply shameful moment for this committee and I deeply regret that the majority would undertake this effort while the president and secretary of State are negotiating very delicate matters on our behalf and on the behalf of world peace,” Connolly said.

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