Politics

Benghazi whistle-blower a Democrat, voted for Hillary and Obama twice

Font Size:

A key Benghazi whistle-blower who has allegedly been punished for speaking out against the administration is a registered Democrat who voted for both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

The lawyer of Gregory Hicks, the former U.S. deputy chief of mission in Libya who testified before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Wednesday, confirmed the information to The Daily Caller on Saturday.

According to the lawyer, Victoria Toensing, Hicks voted for Clinton during the 2008 primary, and for then-Illinois Sen. Obama in the 2008 general election. He again voted for Obama in 2012.

“The fact is he is a registered Democrat in Virginia. The fact is he voted for Hilary in the primary and Obama and then again for Obama,” Toensing said.

Toensing added that she did not know he was a Democrat until the day before the hearing.

“I’m not interested in that,” she said. “I’m interested in government not abusing its powers.”

Hicks testified before the House Oversight Committee this week regarding the events that took place on Sept. 11, 2012 in Benghazi and recalled how the State Department told him not to cooperate with the congressional investigation into the events, which led to the deaths of four Americans.

Hicks further testified that he has been demoted since Benghazi.

“The job now is a significant … it’s a demotion,” Hicks said before the committee. “Foreign-affairs officer is a designation that is given to our civil service colleagues who are desk officers.  So I’ve been effectively demoted from deputy chief of mission to desk officer.”

The State Department has denied the demotion, saying that Hicks decided to end his assignment in Libya early.

“The Department has not and will not retaliate against Mr. Hicks,” Acting Deputy State Department spokesperson Patrick Ventrell said during a Thursday press briefing. “As he testified yesterday, he decided to shorten his assignment in Libya following the attacks, in part due to understandable family reasons, and that he has followed standard employment processes.”

According to Toensing, however, the administration is simply lying.

“The State Department is lying — saying he was not demoted. It is almost impossible under law for them to take away anybody’s salary. But they demoted him to a job where he has no meaningful work,” she said. “He had a choice between no job whatsoever and a job that didn’t have any meaningful work. And I say this is like telling a starving man he can have no food or he can have the rotten beef. And if he chooses the rotten beef, is that a choice?”

Follow Caroline on Twitter

PREMIUM ARTICLE: Subscribe To Keep Reading

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign Up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
BENEFITS READERS PASS PATRIOTS FOUNDERS
Daily and Breaking Newsletters
Daily Caller Shows
Ad Free Experience
Exclusive Articles
Custom Newsletters
Editor Daily Rundown
Behind The Scenes Coverage
Award Winning Documentaries
Patriot War Room
Patriot Live Chat
Exclusive Events
Gold Membership Card
Tucker Mug

What does Founders Club include?

Tucker Mug and Membership Card
Founders

Readers,

Instead of sucking up to the political and corporate powers that dominate America, The Daily Caller is fighting for you — our readers. We humbly ask you to consider joining us in this fight.

Now that millions of readers are rejecting the increasingly biased and even corrupt corporate media and joining us daily, there are powerful forces lined up to stop us: the old guard of the news media hopes to marginalize us; the big corporate ad agencies want to deprive us of revenue and put us out of business; senators threaten to have our reporters arrested for asking simple questions; the big tech platforms want to limit our ability to communicate with you; and the political party establishments feel threatened by our independence.

We don't complain -- we can't stand complainers -- but we do call it how we see it. We have a fight on our hands, and it's intense. We need your help to smash through the big tech, big media and big government blockade.

We're the insurgent outsiders for a reason: our deep-dive investigations hold the powerful to account. Our original videos undermine their narratives on a daily basis. Even our insistence on having fun infuriates them -- because we won’t bend the knee to political correctness.

One reason we stand apart is because we are not afraid to say we love America. We love her with every fiber of our being, and we think she's worth saving from today’s craziness.

Help us save her.

A second reason we stand out is the sheer number of honest responsible reporters we have helped train. We have trained so many solid reporters that they now hold prominent positions at publications across the political spectrum. Hear a rare reasonable voice at a place like CNN? There’s a good chance they were trained at Daily Caller. Same goes for the numerous Daily Caller alumni dominating the news coverage at outlets such as Fox News, Newsmax, Daily Wire and many others.

Simply put, America needs solid reporters fighting to tell the truth or we will never have honest elections or a fair system. We are working tirelessly to make that happen and we are making a difference.

Since 2010, The Daily Caller has grown immensely. We're in the halls of Congress. We're in the Oval Office. And we're in up to 20 million homes every single month. That's 20 million Americans like you who are impossible to ignore.

We can overcome the forces lined up against all of us. This is an important mission but we can’t do it unless you — the everyday Americans forgotten by the establishment — have our back.

Please consider becoming a Daily Caller Patriot today, and help us keep doing work that holds politicians, corporations and other leaders accountable. Help us thumb our noses at political correctness. Help us train a new generation of news reporters who will actually tell the truth. And help us remind Americans everywhere that there are millions of us who remain clear-eyed about our country's greatness.

In return for membership, Daily Caller Patriots will be able to read The Daily Caller without any of the ads that we have long used to support our mission. We know the ads drive you crazy. They drive us crazy too. But we need revenue to keep the fight going. If you join us, we will cut out the ads for you and put every Lincoln-headed cent we earn into amplifying our voice, training even more solid reporters, and giving you the ad-free experience and lightning fast website you deserve.

Patriots will also be eligible for Patriots Only content, newsletters, chats and live events with our reporters and editors. It's simple: welcome us into your lives, and we'll welcome you into ours.

We can save America together.

Become a Daily Caller Patriot today.

Signature

Neil Patel