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Sen. Ron Johnson: Hillary Clinton Planned to Get Emotional During Benghazi Testimony to 'Get Out of Questions
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gets ready to leave after testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on the September 11, 2012 attack on the US mission in Benghazi, Libya, during a hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on January 23, 2013. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Wednesday warned of rising militancy in the wake of the Arab Spring, in an emotional and at times heated testimony into the deadly Benghazi attack.'Benghazi didn't happen in a vacuum,' Clinton said at the start of a Senate hearing into the September 11 assault on a US mission in eastern Libya.'The Arab revolutions have scrambled power dynamics and shattered security forces across the region,' she told the Foreign Relations committee called to review the lessons learned from the attack, in which US ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans were killed. Credit: AFP/Getty Images

Sen. Ron Johnson: Hillary Clinton Planned to Get Emotional During Benghazi Testimony to 'Get Out of Questions

"I think she just decided before she was going to describe emotionally the four dead Americans, the heroes, and use that as her trump card..."

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton faces the Republican members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee as she answers questions about the deadly September attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans, on Capitol Hill, Wednesday, Jan. 23, 2013. On the dais, from left are, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., and Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisc. Credit: AP

After prompting the most heated response from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during Wednesday's congressional Benghazi hearings, Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) said he believes Clinton planned to get emotional while describing the four Americans who died in the attack.

"I'm not sure she had rehearsed for that type of question…I think she just decided before she was going to describe emotionally the four dead Americans, the heroes, and use that as her trump card to get out of the questions," " Johnson told BuzzFeed after the Senate hearing. "It was a good way of getting out of really having to respond to me."

Johnson initially asked Clinton what caused the intelligence failures at the State Department, which initially said the attack was initiated by spontaneous protests stemming from an anti-Muslim YouTube video. He asked the secretary why she didn't just pick up the phone to get some answers.

"With all due respect, the fact is we had four dad Americans. What difference, at this point, does it make?" Clinton said at the hearing.

While Clinton was largely using talking points to give her answers, Johnson said his "common sense" questioning got "under her skin."

Watch the entire exchange here.

"I just don't think she had an answer to that," he added. "Maybe it embarrassed her. Maybe she hadn't thought of it that way."

To read BuzzFeed's full report, click here.

 

Featured image via AFP/Getty

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Jason Howerton

Jason Howerton

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