GOP lawmaker: Blumenthal Benghazi deposition should be released

A Republican member of the House Select Committee on Benghazi says the panel should make public the deposition of Hillary Clinton adviser and confidant Sidney Blumenthal.

“I think it needs to be released,” Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (R-Ga.) told The Hill on Thursday.

{mosads}He also argued that Democratic demands for the release are “an excuse” for the panel’s seven Republicans to do so.

If Westmoreland joined with Democrats on the special panel to vote for the deposition’s release, they’d be within one vote of forcing the matter.

Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) has resisted publishing the deposition, arguing that the select committee hasn’t released a transcript of any of its previous interviews.

Democrats contend that the panel has already released nearly 60 emails to and from Clinton that Blumenthal himself turned over earlier this month.

They also believe the transcript will show the questions centered around political matters and not the 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya, that killed four Americans, including the ambassador.

Westmoreland said that Gowdy is concerned that if the transcript is published, “it would discourage, maybe, some other people from coming in voluntarily,” such as longtime Clinton aide Huma Abedin.

“But this is the only person we had to subpoena to come in,” Westmoreland noted.

Blumenthal appeared before the committee last week.