When you dedicate your life to your country and are willing to lay your life down to protect it, nothing quite prepares you for the feeling of complete abandonment.
But after Benghazi, that’s how I felt.
My teammates and I were left to die with no help. Worse yet, people back home weren’t being told the truth about what happened from either our government or the media. It was all about politics, and it was enraging. There were, however, a few people in Washington who did stand up for us and were dedicated to uncovering the truth.
One such man was Rep. Devin Nunes.
He’s a good, honest man, and while most people were just interested in saving face, Nunes reached out. He made the greatest effort to listen to people like me who were actually on the ground fighting to save American lives.
This is why I can’t keep silent when people like Rep. Adam Schiff attack Nunes’ integrity and call for him to recuse himself from his crucial work. Adam Schiff will always be the man who went on national television to say we were never told to stand down, and that we were only saying so to sell a book.
To a team of Marines, SEALs and an Army Ranger, those are fighting words.
Russia is not our friend, and the American people deserve to know what they did to try and impact our election, and if any Americans helped them to do it. Likewise, the American people deserve to know if outgoing Obama officials inappropriately surveilled President-elect Trump and his team to leak damaging information to the media and the public.
I am 100% confident that Devin Nunes can get to the truth on both of these important issues, and frankly, people like Adam Schiff and Nancy Pelosi either need to be helpful, or they need to shut up and let him do his job.
Oftentimes, people in my line of work are more comfortable down range where things are real, than back home where politicians of both parties play games with seemingly no consequences. To know and face real enemies who want to do our nation harm makes everything else seem insignificant, yet Washington seems only to be concerned with triviality.
Devin Nunes has a hard job ahead of him, but I trust him to do it. So, let’s put aside the games and let him.
Kris Paronto is a former Army Ranger, and as part of the CIA annex security team, helped to save over 20 lives during the September 11, 2012 Benghazi terrorist attack.