to give the funds they desire. >> a lot to chew over from the benghazi testimony and "happening now" will talk than up. thanks for being with us. >> a fox news alert. and the man behind the discreted benghazi talking points getting grilled on capital hill. i am jon scott. >> and i am jenna lee. the former deputy of the cia defending his action on days after the benghazi attack. now, michael morell is denying he cooked the books on the attack and covered it up. those have been the allegations and he said they are not true and rejects claims that prolitical pressure to protect the president and secretary of state hilary clinton forced him

to edit the talking points. there was editing done by one analyst that may have led to confusion. they are focused on the deleted references to al qaeda. >> were they demonstratoring heavy heavy machine guns? >> they don't remember >> but your analyst had attack and al qaeda originally. >> yes. they did. one of the reasons they say they made that change is because it didn't make a lot of sense to say attacked evolved into assaults. >> you are lying on this lady's analysis? is that correct? >> yes. they also changed the phrase they participated in the attacks

to the extremist participated in violent demonstrations. i am having to hard time why you would want to say with four americans dead, the place set on fire, that this is a demonstration rather than an attack when rpg's, machine guns and others were used. how is that a demonstration? >> the change you mentioned from attacks to demonstrations was a change that was made before the senior analyst sent the talking points to the office of congressional affairs. it was a change that was recommended by the operations officers who she was cordinating with and was okay with the

change. >> but my point is you are not counting on the analyst and what she analyzed. you were counting on what other people said was wrong. >> not on that change, sir. she made the change before sending to the congressional affairs >> so she thought they should change it? >> she agreed with the change. >> okay. when is the first time you heard from the chief of station this was a planned, cordinated attack? >> this is complicated. let me walk you through it. the first indication it wasn't a protest was an intelligence report from the station on friday. what that report said was that our officers who went from benghazi base to try to rescue the state department colleagues

didn't see a protest when they arriv arrived. our analyst discounted that for the reasons i explained earlier. the second time was the saturday morning in which the chief of station sent an e-mail with a very short reference to i don't think there was a protest, let me give you two reasons why. and the third time was on sunday when he sent a more detailed note explaining his thoughts. >> two points. you said the information the analyst had was a news report. and i think it came from some calls that were from around benghazi that were made to another country by somebody was what the news report was. the other thing is a demonstration. we saw the demonstrations all

around the world. you are saying you have a problem with the grs team that got there -- i don't think it was an hour >> it was an hour >> i am thinking more like 45 minutes. but when you see those demonstrations they don't last for 30 minutes and everybody go home. you would see people landering around and they didn't see that. they saw the end of an rpg, heavy machine guns and being at. they didn't see anyone with a sign protesting something. if you watch the rest of the videos from demonstrations they are there for hours. >> but the analyst, thought, sir, i am telling you what the analyst thought, was that if there was a protest, when they

believed, outside of the state department facility and the attacks start that most likely that protest will break up and seize. that is what they thought. it isn't unreasonable. >> i want to thank wes moreland and congresswoman for her investigation in this matter. i have two areas i would like to get into quickly. first, when i was asked were it the talking points, i was asking for something simple to give some of the new numbers talking points that were unclassified knowing this would be a media issue. and i am concerned it got to the level it did, and we didn't get the talking points back in a day or two. it goes to show you when we need

something basic in government it goes beyond where it should be. i hope we can learn from the situation. i never expected more man than a year and half after attack we would be talking about who changed the talking points. and i think the focus we need to be on is finding the bad guys that killed americans and make sure we learned from what happened at both areas in benghazi to make sure our facilities for americans, the state and intelligence community are safe, and we know what to do. we need to focus on tracking down the people who did this and i hope we are close to that. i have a letter from the department of defense that said it responded to six congressional investigation in this case and has participated in 50 congressional hearings, briefings and interviews and dedicated thousands of man hours to this and costing the tax

taxpayers millions, the cia has responded in a similar way. how much do you think the cia has spent? >> i cannot guess. >> no evidence i have seen tells us there is no evidence of political motivation that has been uncovered but this still continues. can you tell us what kind of threat terrorist groups still pose to american and the world right now >> i believe the terrorist threat to america today is very significant. the way i talk about this is why still at war with al qaeda, very much. and in that war, both sides have had a great victory. our great victory was the near

defeat of the al qaeda leadership in pakistan. but al qaeda's great victory has been the spread of its ideaology across a wide swath of the muslim world in africa, the northern and eastern parts, in syria, in iraq, and so both sides have had a great victory. and the threat to americans remains very significant. and congressman, i am deeply concerned the threat is going to grow in the years ahead. >> and do you think the fact of whether or not in the beginning it was inspired by the news media from the protest or whether it was a planned attack and at this point how would that

make a difference on the finding of terrorist or dealing with the situation? >> there was no doubt in the analyst mind or my mind that this was a terrorist attack irregardless of what motivated them or if there was a protest >> i would think from that we would move forward and focus on catching the bad guys. the other question quickly i want to get into is we as americans care about our men and women on the ground whether it is military or intelligence. our theme is we never leave an american behind. and there is allegations we left the americans behind in this situation. can you discuss, i think it is important, the longstanding security procedures that cia

stations have in dangerous and remote parts of the world. do they expect they will provide immediate protection no matter where they are in the world? you have your own security and they are well-trained and if it were not for the smoke and what happened, hopefully your people trained and did what they were supposed to do. another thing that is not coming out but i can say the word about and that is about how many americans were saved based on the training of the security force who have seen, from what i have seen and understand, who that security is and what they are trained for. because i want to answer the question did the cia feel abandoned by the u.s. military in this situation? >> no, we did not.

>> can you explain what the security was and how many americans, if not classified, were saved because of the training. >> i don't think i can go into the specific numbers but what i will say is something the chairman said earlier. i have no doubt in my mind, there is no doubt in my mind that had the cia security officers from benghazi base not responded to the state department we would have lost many more officers there. there is no doubt. and there is no doubt in my mind that had cia officers and u.s. military officers responded from tripoli to benghazi, which is over 600 miles, had they not responded that night and went to benghazix that more americans would have died at the cia base in benghazi. so i believe there is a large number of americans who are alive today thanks to the

response of the cia officers at benghazi base and the cia and military officers from tripoli. >> a lot of evidence i have heard, at not time, did anyone make a comment they felt they were abandoned by the u.s. government or cia. >> i know of no stand down in the military orderers. >> i want to get one last question and we on this committee need to respond to the public, yet we have the issue of we cannot violate any law about giving out classified information. but we need some, especially members who haven't been on the

committ committee as long, we guidance with the classified issue. you had to do over, because everyone needs guidance and fact and data and that is the key issue, we are trying to find the fact for the american public, how would you handle this in the future if we make the request of helping us deal with the talking point issue? >> as the committee knows -- sgr >> general clapper gets mad and says he won't do it. >> when i was acting director the second time i asked for a less lessons learned paper on talking point. it had two conclusions. and the first is we should not be in the business of writing unclassified talk points for the american people. we don't do that for the executive branch. and we in general don't do that

for congress. so this paper concluded that we should be reluctant to do this. we are very good at speaking to policy makers. we are not trained at speaking to the american public. we see extremist and terrorist as the same thing. the american public obviously doesn't. so my first idea would have been to push back and say why doesn't the committee take a first stab at writing the talking points and then we will take a look at them. the second conclusion the lessons learned paper came to was if we do write unclassified talking points, a substance expert should be involved in the editing process all the way through and not do experts up front and congressional and public affairs in the middle and only bringing in experts in at

the end. >> you look at general powell who went to the united nations about the mass destruction in iraq and same thing with susan rice relying on the information she was given and then went through a tough time. there is a lot of lessons to here >> yes, sir. >> mr. thornberry. >> i want to try to understand the deputies meeting on the 15th and your edit to the talking points. were you having daily deputy meetings? >> yes, sir, twice a day. >> twice on the 13, 14th and 15th you would have video conference meetings in which you participated as the deputy for the cia

>> that is correct >> and i would presume a deputy from state -- >> fbi, doj and others, yes, sir. >> as we reviewed the emails of the night -- let me back up. as best as you remember, the deputies meetings, the two meetings on the 14th a, i presud benghazi had to be a major issue discussed >> it wasn't. we were not looking backwards at that point. so the focus of the deputies meetings, particularly on saturday and sunday, which susan rice was on the sunday show i was at a deputy meeting. the focus was on keeping americans save where there are

protests and demonstrations. we were looking forward on keeping americans save. >> which is interesting to me. even on the 14th, the basic tenor of the meetings was we got the americans out so we will not worry about libya. >> it isn't like we were not worried about libya. we were worried about tripoli. >> on the two meetings on the 14th, do you remember the talking points? >> no, i don't remember that. >> as i go and look at the emails, as of 9-10 p.m. on the night of the 14, it looked like fbi signed off and the talking points have been editing to reflect the state's concern, although it doesn't say they signed off.

did you have conversations after 10 p.m. from the state department that said we are not happy? sfwl >> no, sir. >> so as of 10 p.m. there is an e-mail that said me made the changes, fbi is okay and can we send them and a brief answer said no. what time was the deputies meeting the next morning? >> i believe it was 8 a.m. i believe. >> and did you have conversations with state department folks or emails from state department folks that morning before the deputies meeting that said we are not happy with the talking points? >> no, sir, but my executive assistance told me the state department wasn't happy. >> the night of the 14th or morning of the 15th? >> the morning. as i arrived at work >> and you testified today that they never came up at the

deputies meetings, the talking points, until you brought them up. it wasn't part of the agenda even though the national security council staff suggested bringing them up >> correct. >> i guess what i am puzzled by is as you look at the edits you made on the chart, you take out most of the words that are in the talking points bake. and even though the fbi is okay with them, you take out words because you are afraid they will damage the fbi investigation, you take out everything that is related to warnings and a bunch of other it seiems like you are more interested in protecting the fbi and the state than they are. it doesn't make sense to me. can you explain the motivation.

>> as i said, earlier, if you look at what i took out, the majority is information related to the warnings. as i said earlier, i not it in appropriate for the cia to say publically that we warned of an attack coming. and we also had in there that we had sent a warning cable to chairo, which i saw no point, but i saw this as a way for cia to pound its chest and say look, we warned, therefore laying all of the blame on the state department. i thought there would be plenty of time to have a conversation about about what was warned, who responded and why. i didn't think that talk should

start publically. >> it says the wide availability of fighters in libya contributed to the attacks. that is just a statement of facts. >> i saw that as speckulative. we didn't know if they had training at that point. i didn't think it was helpful. and i am not saying i made all of the right decisions but that is why i made them. >> it is just a drastic change of what was going on so that is why i am puzzled by the changes you make that are more protective of other agencies than the other agencies are. i thank you for your responses. >> michael morell thank you for coming in and your many years of service. i want to align myself with what

was said in expressing all of our heartfelt sadness for those who were killed and our appreciate for those still alive and served us bravely. they are all heroes. and i think we should focus on what we can do to make sure this never happens again and trying to arrest the murderers who killed these americans. anything short of that is a misplacement >> just taking a pause here and we will return you to the hearing and continue to watch it live as there are a lot of important questions being asked as the former deputy chief of the cia michael morell is on the stand. our chief correspondant is live. walk us through the exchange about the state department and what michael morell was trying to do and why they matter and

why they are a focus >> that exchange is important because what the congressman is saying to michael morell is that you took out half of the talking points text and many of the edits were designed to protect the state department. the congressman said you seem more interested in protecting the state department than the state department is. he took out the warnings that the cia provided saying an attack maybe in the pipeline. that wasn't poplar with the leadership of the state department because they felt it would give congress an attempt to beat up on them because they were not prepared. so at a time for context when four manys are dead, including an ambassador, michael morell said he felt it was quote inappropriate to lay out the facts as they were.

that there had been warnings about the diminish security there and congressman said you seem more interested in protecting the state department than the state department was. >> what do you make of the response of michael morell that he wanted to chest thump saying the cia did warn the state department but didn't want to seem overly political. >> he said his job is to provide the facts and acknowledge there is grund truth in any given situation, even if is unpopular with the policymakers.

then he said i kept it because i'll felt it would be embarrassing and inappropriate. that is a stunning statement to make when four americans are dead. the question is why was michael morell so concerned about displeasing the state department leade leadership in a we took out the talking points. >> interesting points. in general, what do you think is the biggest headline of this hearing so far? >> i think the most stunning headline is michael morell said at every opportunity when he was given a choice of siding with the people on the ground in libya he decided against it. he decided with analyst thousands of miles away with

their assessment that are there was an attack. this is a body blow to the officers who put their neck on the line because of chief of station this is considered the top job because their word is gospel and their job is to provide what is called ground truth. and what michael morell said even though the chief of station reported on the 14th and 15th in an e-mail and then a lengthy report on the 16th that the evidence showed no protest, every time the deputy director of the cia downplayed or dismissed this repor and sided with his analyst in washington who were thousands of miles away from the action. this is an extraordinary

statement to make because this isn't how the cia operated in the past. >> it will be a good question for peter brooks who is joining us. back to you on capital hill, catherine. we are going to go back too hearing and pick up where we are out now. here is michael morell : >> my reaction was two-fold. what she said about the attacks evolving from a protest was what the talking points said and what the community analyst believed. when she talks about the video my reaction was that is not something they said it was attributed. >> you said it was based on reports. how many? numerous? >> roughly a dozen.

i think about half and half. the committee has the documents >> when you finally read ambassador rice's sunday morning transcript or however you found out about it, did you complain? >> i didn't complain to anybody, sir. >> you stated you noted there was a conflict between the cos and the analyst and you immediately addressed it once you noticed. and that way was appropriate. how quick and what do you consider appropriate? >> i addressed it very quickly. sir, i was the one who spotted what the cos said. it was in the bottom of an

e-mail. it was 3-4 sentences. i spotted it saying this is not consistent and we need to dig into this and resolve it. i was the one to do that and that was appropriate and i would expect the deputy chief to do that. i asked the chief of station for more information. he provided it within 24 hours and within 12 hours i asked the analyst to provide their view on whether they should change their analysis based on what the chief of station said. >> would you consider a shift from a protest to a cord eye pp gninat attack a large shift? >> two thoughts. one is that is a significant change.

but the second thought is as i said earlier, we never thought a protest and a terrorist attack were mutually exclusive. what the analyst believed -- >> could it have been a terrorist attack that erupted into a protest? >> sure. absolutely. >> why was there no attempt after the rice went on the talk shows to ever correct the record? in fact, it was more an attack than it was a protest? >> i don't follow you, sir. >> she went out and she said it was soley because of the youtube video. and later we learned no, it was more an attack than it was about the video and there was never n attempt to correct the record >> there is a difference between what it was and what motivated it. no doubt it was a terrorist

attack. to this day we don't know the mo motivation of the people who conducted the attack because we have not caught them. the analyst view it was what happened in cairo and these guys in benghazi saw what happened there and wanted to do the same thing. the other possibility the analyst see is the revenge over a death. we heard from congressman shift the chief of station sees three possibilities. 9/11 anniversary, revenge and the video. the chief of station thinks that the video may have been motivation for the attack in benghazi.

>> yeld back. >> thank you, michael morell. i really appreciate your testimony and given your three decades of service to our nation, also working to protect our security and never in a partisan role or spirit. and i believe what you are telling us today in account of what happened. a and i appreciate the first point you made was you want at a honor the heroes who lost their lives. >> we will break away do to some analysts now. we have lin sweet here and charlie as well. i am a little bit confused what the cia did think about the

attack. what is your take from what testimony we have heard thus far? >> well, there was an amazing exchange that just occurred when michael morell was stating that he thought that at no point did thank a terrorist attack and a prootest were exclusive as if try tryst terrorist attacks just come about. and he said are you suggesting a protest turned into a terrorist attack? he said that could be it. but that is absurd and shows the absurdity of the administration's views all along. to famously ask the question what is the big deal that was asked by hilary clinton and that is a good point. why do they keep spinning the story? why didn't they let the facts

fall out the way they naturally would instead of trying to spin every little aspect of it? i think that is why resitting here talking about it because they went to such efforts to spin all of it. >> i must conclude the white house wanted the public to believe al qaeda was on the run skwn and need the attacks to be a response to a video and the white house used your talking points -- >> we played the wrong soundb e soundbate -- sound byte there -- but the committee is saying the

white house documenteded the talking point and wanted them changed. are we close to getting to the bottom of this? >> i think we are. he is laying out this thinking. he said the biggest mistake the cia made was not fighting back about the talking points. the cia isn't in the business of putting things out in the public and i think the core of this maybe when people had to start editing classified information and put it in shape you can put it out into the public this set the stage for a lot of what happened after that. >> i mislabed him as michael morell , but he was the acting director at the time, he said we should not be in the business of

editing talking points. so why were they doing it anyway? what was so important that the cia neded to get involved in and scrub the other agencies and their mistakes out of the record about what happened that night? >> that is the central question to all of this and the administration isn't answering that and neither is michael morell. he is suggesting we are not good at handling pr trying to minimize what a big deal this was. at the time of the attack, this video they blamed this on, had not been viewed much and very few people heard it. but the second they blamed this attack on the video, that video went viral and all across the world and that sparked hundreds or dozens of protests, deadly protests around the world, and i would argue the cia is

responsible for those protests because they wrongly, knowingly blamed this attack on a protest about a movie and it made the movie famous and sparked violence. >> adam housely has done a fair amount of reporting on this and what happened that night. he is talking this morning as the testimony has been underway, he is talking with someone on the ground in libya that night, probably in benghazi and this person says why did he, meaning michael morell , not ask us who were there directly. analyst knew it was a terror attack within 15-20 minutes. i guess that is a good question, lin. >> if the proceeds you might get some of the answers on

it. but, i think just to separate out the issue of the substance of what happened on the ground, an important question, and representative rogers have been pursuing that and that is important. taking classified information in the form of talking points isn't as important as finding what happened. we are finding out about his thinking and processing >> we are finding out more but there is confusion as well. even despite the testimony. >> lin sweet, charley hurt, we are going to go back to the hearing. let's continue to listen to the house select committee on intelligence as they probe the former acting drouth director of

the cia for what happened that night four americans came under attack and lost their lives in benghazi. >> any evidence your people were influence ved about their politl views? >> i don't know so >> the press report is dominating and analytical work is art, not science, would the analyst have been able to tell the press reports were not a daisy chain of one person reporting and a series of subsequent press reports so the volume looked like a big deal with at but it was one person's information. >> that is something they would look at. that is something they think about when looking at pressure points >> so as mr. miller talked about, the weight of evidence to change over the station chief, the emails i read, he is more direct than what you said in terms of being n attack.

the weight of the evidence was unable to evovercome the decisis making. is that a fair statement? >> that is a fair statement. the analyst stuck with their judgment. >> when you get the information, i think you said that someone in the state department was pushing back on the talking points. and it was said leadership is concerned about the warning language and said my building leadership. who is she talking about? >> you would have to ask her. >> how much higher up does she get? >> you are talking about ms. newland? she was the spokes person for the department at the time. i don't know what the chain of command above her is. >> all right. thank you. this is probably an unfair question to make but there are

comments being made about post-employment and a bunch of guys named michael are involved but would you speak about what role, if any, about your post government service played in the job you have. >> sure, i would be happy to comment on that. my first discussions with beacon global strategy about going to work for them started in november, four months after i left the job. >> november of? >> november of 2013. four months after i left the job. i was attracted to going to work at beacon because i ad mired for

forepoints. i think they are great public servants and they are business people, too. three are democrats and one is a republican and you know him well. he was the staff director of this committee and worked in the bush white house and had romney won the election we would have been on the intelligence team. that is why he went to work there. what i did in september of 2012 had absolutely nothing to do with my going to work for beacon in november of 2013. let me tell you >> thank you for that. and one final question and this may add more confusion nan needed. i have an e-mail change dated 9-15 at 11:15 a.m. it appears to be from matt olsen to a micha michael m -- is that you?

>> yes, that is me >> these are the points that were sent yesterday afternoon based on the request which would have been on the 14th. what point in time did the talking points come? >> i understand and i, too, amcon -- i am confused by this as well. i didn't know there were two sets of talking points. you would know better than i do if there are two sets >> so the reference is the nt sunset >> yes. >> thank you, mr. chairman, i yeld -- yield -- back. >> i want to thank you for testifying today and thank you for your 33 years of service to our country. you have always put the country

first and done your duty in my opinion and been forthcoming in your testimony before the committee whenever you appeared before me since i have been on the committee. and fact you are here on our own reinforces you seriously you believe in the truth. we can all agree benghazi was a terrible tragedy. it is important to remember that we lost four brave americans that day and we must make sure we never let something like that ever happen again >> again, we are continuing to watch the hearing with the house intel committee talking to the head of the cia at the time, michael morell , during the benghazi points. what transspired and what went out to the american people and

questions about what happened to the people that murdered the americans on the ground. peter brooks, former cia officer and fellow of national security affairs at the heritage foundation, we are working on getting soundbytes and i will bring them to you. i am curious because of your background in the cia, and being part of the navy as well, what is the headline for you as you heard what michael morell said today about the talking points and the terrorist attack in benghazi? >> the thing that comes out is this is still a dark day in american history. there were mistakes that were made. i am not convinced the intelligence was not political and maybe levels above michael morell and susan rice who was the last person i would put out to talk on the show, it would have been the state department or the secretary of defense, as

un ambassador i have no idea why she did it. but the white house decides who goes out and faces the camera on sunday. so i am not convinced there wasn't a political sizing of intelligence and i don't understand why they were not it could have been a, b or c and they come down on one thing that covers up the possibility it was a terrible terrorist attack that took four americans lives while the president was saying al qaeda was on the run. i think this is a shame on many levels and a very dark day in american history for a whole >> hos host of reasons. >> michael morell said today, and it has been touched on, about who he trusted as far as

giving an assessment of what happened on the ground. he said it could have been both a protest and a terrorist attack. but that he was taking into account, and i am not going to use the word editing, but balancing what he heard on the ground and what the analyst were telling us in washington, d.c. it might be difficult to say why not trust the people that are there over the people in washington, d.c. >> all good points. and catherine did a great job on this. but why is the cia writing talking points? they should be giving the intelligence facts to the public relations individuals and the spokesperson for the white house and sticking with that. i think they could have been more speculative about it. there is nothing wrong with staying we had as a terrorist

attack and we don't know the reasons, these are possibilities. the biggest tragedy is the fact we have not brought these terrorist to justice for the death of four americans and it instruction of a diplomatic session overseas. that is the biggest tragedy and you can imagine how people feel about that and the signal it sends to enemies around the wormed. >> i have to take a quick commercial break but one of the things michael morell said was they don't know the motivation for the terrorist on the ground and why they killed americans. i will take that up with you after the break. 18 months another hearing on benghazi and we will be right back with more on "happening now" in a moment.

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track,. >> peter brook is back with us and the national security here. you see peter king on your screen. he'll be joining us next hour with his take on what has tran expired in front of the house committee who's now speaking with mike morrell. back to that point which was the frustration of not having caught the men who killed americans on the ground in benghazi on september 11, 2012. director morell said this, he doesn't know the motivation of these terrorists. a degreeman said that he feels more time should be spent on find being the bad guys here and less time looking backwards. peter, your thoughts, why, haven't we found these individuals and are we prioritizing wrong in the focus

of the time, for example, today on what transpired in the past and the fact we haven't caught anyone now? >> jenna, i might be wrong but my understanding is there are a number of mugshots on the fbi's website for information leading to the capture of certain individuals. we've seen reporting in the press including on this station, talking about individuals who have been implicated in these attacks and they're still walking the streets of benghazi. my concern is once again, i don't have access to the information that the intelligence committee did. i didn't hear what the chief of stations said. i'm hearing part of what mr. morell said so it's hard to judge that. the fact that you possibility out, 18 months later we have not brought these individuals to justice. i think we certainly could have made greater progress on that effort and i would think it would be important to the american people, to the families and also to send a signal to those who would do us harm that if you do something terrible like you did in in benghazi,

there's a price to pay pup is it is look of resources? >> no, not a lack of resources. we have drones,s a very capable military. they went into pack tap. pakistan. but i think there is part of it that they wanted to work with the libyan government to bring these family to justice but my view is that justice should be swift and ju just and neither hs happened. once again it makes us look weak, whether russia or china or the china seas and on this issue of terrorism, it makes us look weak and do terrible things to americans and american property and interested with impugnty and i think that's one of the biggest tragedies of this whole situation. >> what about policies still haunting us 18 months later.

peter, thank you. we'll rejoin the hearing. congressman cane. >> you have the influence on the focal point. >> i did not know anything about what was going on with general petraeus until the day he resigned? >> nobody said anything to you, nobody in the white house said anything to you at all? >> no. >> you had no knowledge at ultimate? >> no. >> when you accompanied susan rice to senator mccain and senator gram, is it customary? >> i was asked to to go. >> is that customary to be done? >> it was an add hoc ad hock th. it was not a presidential nominee. she had not. nominated yet. she was going up there to try to explain what she said what she

said on the sunday show. i was asked to go with her. >> who asked you vo: once upon a time

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>> new on east coast, tough questions with capitol hill for a man at the center of the benghazi investigation at least for today. welcome to this hour. i'm jenna lee. >> i'm john scott. the former acting director of the ceo, mike morrell testifying on capitol hill right now about his response to the benghazi attack. he is accused of playing down reports from the ceo's top officer on the ground that there actually was no protest before that deadly terror attack on the u son sliu.s. consulate in liby. four americans including our ambassador were murdered in the benghazi attack. stevens had requested additional security in the months ahead of the attack. mr. morell was asked why if he knew references to al qaeda were taken out of the obama administration's talking point did he not say anything. >> the time i did not know. but to be fair and in

retrospect, what i wish i would have done was to say to you, chairman, i do not know who took al qaeda out of the talking points but you should know that i myself made a number of changes earlier there was no edward nation? >> so the talking points were sent to the white house. the white house, the national security staff, actually, the national security staff, suggested three changes, all of them were editorial in nature. >> chairman rogers also asking mr. morell c the attack was characterized as a random protest when witnesses report e this wareportedthere was no demt night. >> i believe what my analysts said. i believed it to be a terrorist attack. you see, we never saw the two things that was mutually exclusive. >> reare learning the ceo

employees who were in benghazi as that attack unfolded are angry that the ceo's inspector general's office never conducted an investigation into what happen that night. adam housely getting reaction of someone on the ground the night of the attack and adam, pretty upset, savannah. >> there's a lot of people upset, getting information in, you might imagine, fast and furious, that the only people on the ground in benghazi but other parts of libya and back in d.c. operativey to the information and they're upset with a number of things being said. according to morell's testimony, he's basically ignoring the men on the ground that night and what they saw and felt. also, he want to know, the quote was this, why did he not talk to us directly? he would have had to speculate if he was just talking to us directly. that's the quote. he wouldn't have had to speculate if he just talked to us directly. this goes along with the line phs or reporting that continues

up to today, which is the ceo and a lot of people on the ground there, that night are upset there was no investigation done. there had been two complains filed with the ceo internally and the office ofinspector general didn't do anything. here is what the senator said. >> i think it's highly unacceptable for the investigation to be staymied byy one of the culprits. the ceo has never been accrued e allowed to do an internal investigation because the person we're not investigating made that decision. >> graham indicationing that more well was to the one who told the ceo not to investigate. it makes no sense, the same people upset, hearing mike morrell testify right now, saying that he did not take their information seriously and

took analysts seriously said don't investigate. they're upset, there are a lot of questions now because you've heard a couple of members on the democratic side say they have not heard any testimony, for example, that people asked for help and that comes into question. there's going to be a lot of questions and holdin householdim the testimony. they would have you believe that the white house came to the conclusion this was a protest that everybody was telling them it wasn't. john? >> they weren't worth listening to the people on the ground, at least the people you're talking to? >> exactly. >> adam howsley, joining us live. thank you. /we'll get back to the hearing now, the house select committee on intelligence quizzing mike morrell, the former acting director of the ceo. apple. >> a serious intell product that you brought up on the 13th. >> so i don't remember, i don't

remember saying that there was a protest when -- at the deputies, on the 13th, but i would not be surprised at all that i did so. >> maybe this will stir your recollecrecollection. you got an update from the chief, mr. mcdonough lead the call. and then mr. mcdonough turned to you and you talked about this new stream of this new product, is that neglect. >> correct. >> is that right in the. >> so again, i don't remember, but as i said, i would not be surprised if i briefed the deputies on the 13th that the attack had evolved from a protest. why wouldn't i be surprised? >> because that very morning, we published a piece that said that and my job as deputy director

was to representative the views of the ceo at the deput cia at y meeting. >> so did you, did the deputy of national security advisor, mcdonough, did he know about that product before you mentioned it? >> which product are we talking building? on the 13th? >> yes. >> he would have read that product that morning. >> had you conspired beforehand? >> no. conspired to do what? >> to talk about the protest that lead to the attack. >> no. >> so you had not talked to dennis mcdonough, he was not prompting you to announce this? >> this was the cua's considered judgmenia's writtenjudgment. >> i thought it was all of the community signed up on the product. >> correct. >> i think one of the problems here is the station chief, the base chief, the diplomatic

security, dod officials and cia station personnel in benghazi have all reported by this time, that the assault began as a preplanned attack, not a protest. >> so in other words, the product that you were using on the 13th was contradicted by every single person on the ground in libya. >> didn't know it at the time isn't sir. , sir. not until saturday morning. >> what were you talking about on the deputy's committee meeting on the 12th and 13t 13th? >> on the 12th, there was no discussion of a protest. there was no discussion of a protest on the 12th. on the 13th, any discussion of the protest would have been based on the classified product produced that morning. >> were you ever involved in any discussions with tri trip trip e

sunny. >> yes. >> wouldn't that have said that. >> they did not say this was not a protest. >> the chairman actually went out on -- he said in his openin. we had hat this committee significant intelligence products, the chairmanch our committee was able to say, this was an take. on the 12, i believe. you're telling me, you're on call with tripoee with a deputy's committee and you don't know until the 14th or 15t 15th that everybody on the ground believeths was a believea pre-manned attack? >> we believe from the get-go this was an attack. we believe from the get-go this was a trys terrorist attack. the analysts did not believe then or now that there was significance preplanning.

>> i understand that, mr. morell. but the problem is that you have all of these conflicting stories. the stories that you talked with senators and what mr. keen brought up, they were changed by the fbi, not the white house. later you took responsibility for that and then there is other contradictions about whether or not in the talks points about whether the white house was involved or not. all of this could be false but i lead your testimony and you have an excuse for everything. forrering, fofor everything, wh, but when the chairman asks you about when you sat next to jim clapper in november of 2012, you don't have an excuse, you only have an apology. >> i have an explanation of why i did not say anything in response to the question, who

took al qaeda out of the talking points because i did not know at the time who did that. my apology -- >> you sat in front of our committee in november of 20123 an2012and you wouldn't have hade here today if you said what you knee at the time. >> i don't believe that at all, sir. i would be here anyway. the only thing i would be able to say at the time was mr. chairman, i do not know who removed al qaeda from the talking point but what i can tell you, mr. chairman, is that i myself played a role in those talking points. that was the only thing i could have said at the time. >> i know my time expired, mr. chairman. >> mr. chair, thank you. mr. morell, on september 11th, we know that there's a fair amount of activity that was going on at the compound that day in benghazi. chris steeps was active, the turkish ambassador came to visit

at the compound that day. we know from eyewitness testimony on the ground, from the rso who was there, that the turkish ambassador, when he was there and all through the day, there were no sightings, no indication in any way of any gathering of the any protesters around the cop pound, aroundses benghazi. there was february 17t february 17th brigade. there were people there offering security. no one at any time, prior to the attacks, gave my indication that there was a protest going on at the compound. the rso himself said there was nothing going on at the compound. the chief of the station in tripolee had no indication of any profit going on. the political officers had no indication of anything going on. the grf officers coming from and

next over, no one, anyone involved in this situation, no one had any indication of a protest going on and yet, the obama administration allowed for the first time and the first public disclosure, five times on the subpoena day morning shows, made a false narrative that a you're video was the reason that explained there were protesters that we now know are apparitions that never existed were there. this is a false narrative. that is why this is not a small issue but a big itch, mr. morellissue.we have cables s that don't lie. that's not a conspiracy. and emails and the cable, it's very clear about what we knew and when we knew it. we know while the attack was going on, that there was already

from the state apartment at 4:05 p.m., an alert that was put out from the state department that the compound was under attack. the second was at 6:08 p.m., that al qaeda linked terrorist group in libya claimed credit for the attack. we also know that a cable that was sent on september 12th, by cia station chief in libya reported, eyewitnesses confirmed islamic militants and made clear u.s. had come under attack, even your first draft in the cia, distributed internally showed, at 11:15 a.m., date stamped on it, that the ceo and u.s. cia ky participated in the attack. all of that we knew. what changed is when the talking points prepared again by your office, when those talking

points intersected with the white house and those organizations within the white house, included senior state department officials, senior national security officials. all of those that you talked to us about, robert cardillo, lisa, matt, ben, the only change that happened were senior white house officials. and we know from the emails, particularly from victoria newland, that has p been referenced by my colleagues from the date stamped time against at 9:24 p.m., she wrote that the problem remains. her superiors were unhappy. the changes that were made did not resolve my issues or those of my buildings's leader and ben rose from the national foreign policy further advised the group, issues will be resolved in a meeting with meeting administration officials at the white house. at the white house.

white house, saturday,before msy show. they were resolved in the favor of the white house. what's odd here is that the false narrative that was given on sunday morning, on the sunday morning shows, somehow it strangely added up with the view of the white house six weeks before the presidential election that al qaeda was nearly defeated and the global war on terror was over. everyone knows that wasn't true. that al qaeda wasn't defeated. everybody on this committee, both sides knows that the global war on terror was not or. that was the narrative of the white house and the run-up to the presidential election. how weird that that ultimately was reflected in the talking points against all knowledge from people on the ground and knowledge that this committee had. that's why we're upset. because the american people from my perspective, were

intentionally mislead by this administration as to what happened in benghazi. >> chairman, can i respond? i would make two point, ma'am. number one, the narrative that the attack evolved spontaneously from a protest was a narrative that intelligence analysts believed, not just cia but intelligence community analysts. that turned out to be incorrect but that is what they believed at the time. so there is no politics there whatsoever. that's point number one. point number two is let met actually give you the facts of what the state department changed in those talking points and what the courthouse changes. the white house changed three things. the first thing the white house changed was to add cairo in front of the word embassy for the sake of clarity and the second thing was to rearrange a couple of sentences and the

third thing the white house changed was to change consulate to diplomatic post for accuracy. those are the only changes the white house made. the changes the state department made, just two, they wanted to change consulate to the white house post. the second change was to remove the entire bullet because state department said it was premature to single out a specific group and the cia agreed because the only unclassified evidence we had at the time was the public statement which they then retracted. so the state department and the white house made five changes only, all of them in my view, fairly and significant. >> mr. morell, we didn't have to change because you made the changes for them. that's why you're in front of this committee today. you made significant substantive

changes for the white house, whether it was on -- but we know you are the ones that made the changes. not the individuals on the ground who had eyewitness testimony and who sent you a cable that it was not april 10th, that was an attack. those were intentionally ignored. so, ma'am, do you believe that we should have accepted the chief of station's view without question that there was a protest. >> i believe the totality of the information was obvious and there was a mis-intention of the public. >> if you believe we should have accepted his explanation of what happened, you need to accept his view it to could have been a video that motivated it that

night. >> we spoke with him yesterday behind closed doors. he as adamant from the very beginning that this was not a spontaneous protest. we heard from him directly yesterday, that at no time did he believe it was based upon the video. it isn't just him. it's the rso, the chief of the state. it's those who came from annex, the political officers, all of them agreed. you take that versus some press report and one signal versus -- the weight and balance aren't even equal. it isn't even equal. the evidence overwhelming pointed to an attack that was al qaeda or je judhadist relate. >> there was one more significance, that was not our understanding. >> there was reporting from the cia station that there was a protest as well as from the department of defense.

>> there was a unit b that was sitting and from the department of defense. multiple intelligencdefense. >> thank you, mr. chair. thanks mr. morell for being here. thank you for your service tour nation and i want to thank everyone. >> fireworks on kill as m more, acting deputy -- he was the deputy director and acting director of the cua at the time of the peninsul benghazi attacke testified in front of that committee. you heard representative michelle bachmann, republican from minnesota giving a summation of what republicans believe, man believe is the problem with what happened that night, the talking points were adjusted to reflect the administration's claim and in fact the obama campaign claim

that al qaeda was on the run. if you would like to continue to watch the hearings, they're streaming live on fox news and in a moment we'll speak with peter king in new york, a man who clashed with the witness during this morning testimony and he'll be our guest. that's coming up. these days, everything your business does

is done on the internet. and tomorrow you'll do even more. that's what comcast business was built for. slow dsl from the phone company was built for stuff like this. switch to comcast business internet. then add voice and tv for just $34.90 more per month. and you'll be ready for tomorrow today. comcast business. built for business. record? in fact it was more an attack than it was a protest. >> i don't follow, you sir? >> she went out and she said it was solely because of the youtube video. and later we learned that no, it was more an attack than it was about the youtube video. there was never an attempt to correct the record. >> sir, there's a difference between what it was, which was a terrorist attack, and what motivated it. those are two completely

different things. no doubt it was a terrorist attack. to this day we still don't know the motivations of the people who conducted the attack because we haven't caught any of them. jon: joining us now is a member of that house intelligence committee holding the hearings, new york congressman peter king. he has been good enough to step out of the hearing to talk with just for amendment mo. a terror attack motivated by a film, congressman, does that make sense to you. >> no. that is why there so so much anger and frustration among the committee and the american people. the administration has not told the truth from the beginning. michael morell was part of that, that whole process all along. he gave a lot of excuses today and a lot of reasons. the fact to believe him you have to believe basically everything that is contradictory to the facts. for instance, morell, michael morell was sitting in the intelligence committee hearing room in november of 2012 when we were trying to find out who changed the talking points.

he sat there quietly. we had no idea he was even involved in the talking points until nine months after the talking points were done yet he was before the committee time and again. never volunteered that at all. again who heard him say now to congressman miller, somehow trying to say the difference between a terrorist attack and reasons for the attack, bottom line is, susan rice and the administration told the american people it arose out of a video and demonstration. they never mentioned terrorism at all. that is the reality. they can't rewrite history. jon: mike morell was a career cia officer. he served under the bush administration. what would be his motivation, you know, as apolitical intelligence guy to rewrite the talking points or to manipulate the talking points to make the administration happy? >> well the fact is that every turn he did do what the administration wanted and as i pointed out and again, gave an explanation for this, he is now in a very prominent firm which has a number of people from the

state department, from the administration who were there and he is doing very well with them. whether or not that is the reason i don't know. maybe he just wanted to endear himself. maybe he thought he had a chance to become the next cia director. during this time general petraeus was under investigation as we found out later. could be well that michael morell thought he could have a chance to become the head of the cia, the fact of the matter is the cia was not listening to the station chief and peel on the ground last night who said this had nothing to do with the video, is that correct. >> absolutely. everyone on the ground, everyone on the ground including the cia station chief in libya said clearly this was a terrorist attack. this was an attack did not arise out after demonstration. they made that clear several times during that week. congressman nunez brought out, every person on the ground at every level in the defense department, and the cia said that this was an attack. there is no evidence of a

demonstration whatsoever. but most importantly, as you said, jon, the cia station chief said it and said it again and again, that this was, this was an attack and he did not buy into the narrative at all of the story that this was arising out of a demonstration. jon: the horrible irony here, it seems to me, that four americans are dead, their families are left looking for answers. the president promised that we would get to the bottom of what happened and we would apprehend the people who killed our civil servants. and yet the only person ever to serve anytime in connection with this whole incident is the guy who made that "innocence of muslims" movie. >> absolutely disgraceful. the fact is, that we know who did it. we have very good indications who did it. we can not take action against him we want to because underthe law, you have to be al qaeda to be attacked in the way it should be done and this administration is refusing to say these people

are al qaeda even though all the evidence clearly suggests they are part of an islamic terrorist movement. you have people walking free, who murdered americans, and admin says does not want to say they are members of al qaeda under the ground we have to attack al qaeda. jon: we will let you go back to the hearings. thank you for taking time to talk to us. we'll continue to follow those hearing as well. thank you, congressman peter king of new york. jenna: remember we watched hearing streaming online. political fallout, so many questions on the bottom line, obamacare, how much will it cost the economy, and you, and we'll ask a former congressional budget office director next. and tea parties. i'll have more awkward conversations than i'm equipped for, because i'm raising two girls on my own. i'll worry about the economy more than a few times before they're grown. but it's for them, so i've found a way. who matters most to you says the most about you.

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jon: mike morell, who headed the cia, testifying in front of the house intelligence committee about what happened on the night of the benghazi terror attack september 11th, 2012. let's go back to the hearings right now. >> let me say something else. chiefs of station are encouraged, if they have a different view, to write their own analysis and disseminate it to policymakers. they're encouraged to do that. >> let me switch, if i could. you also talked about the military that showed up the next day at the annex. who is the military that, and did they -- >> there were two military officers from tripoli who

volunteered. >> right. >> to go with our officers to benghazi and those two individuals are heroes, absolute heroes. they were on the roof when those mortars hit and they, they successfully removed the injured and the dead from that roof under fire. they have been dedicated -- decorated, rightfully so and i'm grateful they volunteered to go to benghazi that night because had they not volunteered more people would have died. >> this is outside of your lean and when we're talking about the annex and personnel there, what can americans expect in the future should something like this happen again and to try to avoid it? that is where i think all of us want to go to and not have four people get killed and to what the people on the ground that are assigned to those places can expect when they go and serve there? if this would happen again, and

we've heard from time and time defend that there wasn't enough time for there to be a military or some kind of special forces response because of the distance that responders were from benghazi that day in a very hot spot but whatever. what, what, my question is, is that at the time that the ambassador stevens died, which was shortly after midnight, and the amount of time that went on, the amount of hours that went on, before your two military guys showed up and mortars at the annex stopped we were told there was not enough time for a military response to get there but the one question i continue to have and the one question we need to know moving forward to we can keep your agents safe and our embassies safe, how did they know at the time ambassador stevens was killed, the administration, the secretary of state, you, how did they know when it was going to end such

that there wouldn't be enough time to get a military response there? it ended at dawn. they were hoping it would end at dawn. the people were in the annex but we had no, absolutely no idea that would be the case. what if it went on for eight to 10 to 12 more hours? my problem is i don't feel like the administration was ever going to send a response to benghazi and put boots on the ground in another middle easten country because of whatever perception that might have political or other wise. but for them to just say there wasn't enough time to get anybody, how did they know when it was going to end? >> so i can't tell you about the decision-making and discussions at the department of defense because i'm totally unaware of those. but what i can tell you is that there were three attacks that night. there was the attack on the diplomatic facility in benghazi. when, when our officers showed

up at the diplomatic facility and rescued the state department officers and took them back to the cia annex, there was a second attack. and it was, it occurred immediately upon the return to our base. that attack lasted about a half hour or so and that attack was repulsed. things were quiet. things were quiet for a number of hours. i don't know exactly, 3 1/2, four hours, but things were quiet before, what i think happened the guys who did the first attack on the annex went away, got themselves heavier weapons including mortars and came back for another go at it. so there was a period of time in which it appeared this was over. now that doesn't answer, i understand that doesn't answer your question completely but i just offer that context. >> okay. mr. chairman, i appreciate but for the safety of people like this in the future just because there is gap in time, knowing nobody is coming from the united states of america is very

concerning to me. >> mr. chairman, can i have one more second? is that okay. >> i think you've asked the most important question, which is, what can we do going forward to minimize the chance of this happening again. we will never be able to guaranty that it won't happen again. there is always risk. but i think the thing that is we need to do to make sure this doesn't happen again is one, i think we need time prove our intelligence collection. that in these kind of places like benghazi where there is real risk, we need to make sure that we have battlefield kind of awareness. i think this committee knows that in the days leading up to the attack in benghazi we were about ready to install a special system at our base in benghazi that would have given us better intelligence. so we need better intelligence. two, we need to make sure the security posture of these facilities is as good as we possibly can be. three, we need to make sure that the military is always postured in a way it can respond quickly

if necessary. >> mr. thornberry. >> mr. morell, in addition to the reasons you were discussing with mr. lobiondo and mr. rooney on why this is important, there is another area i want to ask you about. we have heard for some time about the involvement of the national security council staff in day-to-day running of military operations, intelligence operations around the world. secretary gates talks about this very explicitly in his memoirs and his anger at the micromanagement coming from the same staffers at the white house and talks about secretary clinton's view of the same thing and others have written about that frustration. you served as deputy director of

the cia, acting director of the cia. did you experience such frustrations as secretary gates and clinton and others? >> sir, as you know, the central intelligence agency conducts some extremely sensitive operations. and i routinely, routinely discussed those operations with mr. brennan and with mr. mcdonough. i would get asked a lot of questions just as i get asked a lot of questions here. i never felt i was being micromanaged there nor have i ever felt i was being micromanaged here. >> but did you experience, have knowledge of national security council staffers directly calling chiefs of station around the world and being down into the day-to-day involvement? >> that didn't happen, to my knowledge. the interaction between the national security staff and the central intelligence agency was

almost exclusively, not largely, but almost exclusively from mr. mcdonough and mr. brennan to me. >> and so, and i guess what i'm wondering is, is that because of your level? because we have all these emails that show a variety of people under them that were involved in these talking points and other things. and, i guess where i'm going, the light that shines on the day-to-day operations, what does that tell us about, not only how this administration works but the bigger institutional dangers? let me back up for just a second. cia 33 years? >> yes, sir. >> would you say that the cia is more independent today than it was when you entered or less? from, micromanagement, political pressure. and i don't mean bee it republican or bee it democrat,

but the influence of bottomses at the white house? >> horde for me to say. very hard for me to say because when i started in 1980 i had no contact, association, interaction with the white house i was 21 years old. >> yeah. >> so it's really a question of my time working with the bush administration and with the obama administration. i did not see a huge difference about questions and what we were doing analytically and operations between the two administrations. >> well, some of us have been around nearly as long as you and remember iran-contra and the difficulties when operations are run out of the white house and it raises grave concerns, again institutional concerns, as important as this incident is,

even, even beyond. and particularly candid comments of some people who have served high in the administration i think raise that, which relates to the topics we're having here today. >> fair. >> thank you. >> thank you, mr. chairman. just to clear up a couple things. mr. morell, your testimony about things were quiet for three hours is in direct conflict with things that we have heard from the grs folks that were there at the annex on the ground during that time period. when you with president bush in florida and you immediately came up with aat this was a usama bin laden, al qaeda, what, i mean, and i don't want you to, i'm not asking to you go back through your thought process but, what gave you the ability to know that? >> because i knew at the time

that there were only two countries who were capable of doing something like what happened on 9/11. iran and iraq. and i thought they would have everything to lose and nothing to gain by doing so. and i knew there was one other organization in the world who had that capability and it was al qaeda. so that is why i came to that conclusion. >> when, between february and the attack, february 12 and the attack, we have approximately 4,000 pages of intelligence reporting that came out of the cia. and in for the libya. so. so i'm sure you were aware of all of that? >> absolutely. absolutely. >> you were aware of the attack on the british ambassador? >> yes, sir. >> the red cross. the two or three bombings that were at the facility.

and this was september the 11th, the 11th anniversary of 9/11. was it not in your thought process then seen ore been aware of these 4 how pages of tell wednesday -- 4,000 pages of intelligence especially the july 12 assessment that the cia put out that about al qaeda becoming stronger in libya, did you not go through that thought process and come up with immediately in your mind that who was capable of doing this, who would want to do it, on the 9/11 anniversary? especially with your knowledge with all those intelligence reports? >> so, we, cia sent out a came to all stations and bases in the days before the anniversary

saying, hey, pay attention. it's the anniversary. you know, this would be a great time for these guys to hit us and please share this with your liaison partners and please share this with the chief of mission and with rsos. and so that, that warning did go out and that is something we always paid attention to was the anniversary of 9/11, absolutely. >> so your thought process never said it could be al qaeda? >> no. my thought process, the analysts said from the get-go that al qaeda was involved in this attack, from the get-go. >> so they said it was involved in the attack? >> yes. >> but you took it out of the talking points. >> i did not take it out. some people have alleged that i personally took out al qaeda from the talking points. that is not true. >> who did? >> the group of officers from

our office of congressional affairs and from our office of public affairs took it out. i did not take it out. i did not know it was in there when i looked at the talking points. it turns out that taking it out was the right thing to do. and let me explain why. because the only way we knew that anybody who was involved in that attack that night was associated with al qaeda was from classified sources. and so to leave it in, the director would have had to declassify that information. and i don't like think that what this committee was asking for. in fact i know that this committee was not asking for us to declassify anything. so it turns out in retrospect taking it out right thing to do from a sources and methods perspective. >> so the classified it was al qaeda, i'm confused here.

>> so the way the only way, sir, the only way we knew that some of the people who were involved in the attack that night were associated with al qaeda was from classified sources. >> did those classified sources tell you that it was a demonstration? >> there were classified sources who told us it was a demonstration. i don't know if it was the same classified sources or not. jenna: nearly three hours in on this testimony by mike morell who is acting director of the cia during the time of the benghazi terror attacks. we'll be streaming this hearing live continually on foxnews.com. we're going to pick it up as well after a quick break here on "happening now." >> in favor of -- ♪ ...work with equity experts... who work with regional experts... that's when expertise happens. mfs. because there is no expertise without collaboration. scotts wraps each seed in a brilliant water smart plus coating,

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jon: a fox news alert. the house intelligence committee continuing its inquiries of mike morell and acting and actual deputy head of the cia at the time of the benghazi attacks. he is explaining more what happened that night and controversies that followed. let's continue to listen. >> coordinated it across the intelligence community. >> so you're telling me like dia approved? >> i don't know exactly which ones. i don't know exactly which ones. you will have to ask the agency for that. but it was coordinated in the intelligence community and if the dni were here he would tell you it was a intelligence community view. >> who are the analysts in i know who the boss was. do we know who the analysts were? is there a team. >> sure, there are analyst who is focus on extremist group, terrorist groups in north africa and i believe it was those analyst that is working on this product. >> you mentioned there were, when you looked into this, you said, paraphrasing here but you

said there were more data points that showed there was, that there was a protest, and was, you used data points. >> so what i said in the written, in the written statement was that there were a handful, there were a dozen or so reports both press reports and intelligence reports saying that there was a protest. >> but isn't it true, hold on, let me just clarify it. there were press, most of the dozen thaw referenced were mostly press reports. there were only a few outlyers as related to sigint and humint reports. and human intand sig int, this is -- sigint reporting we had at the time, there was more humint and sigint reports that said there was pretest and did. >> not true. not true. >> i believe it is true. >> it's not true.

congressman, the time the analyst wrote the piece published on the 13th the only information they had about a protest was that there was a protest. there was not a single piece of information that there was not a protest. that's what i was told by the analysts. >> there were, you may not have known about it but, all the eyewitnesses on the ground had emails and there were live chats and all kinds of things. >> the analysts did not have access to what the people on the ground knew or were saying at the time. >> well -- i would like to at some point go down to the cia and meet with all these analysts and explain this to me. >> i'm sure they would welcome it. >> i sure don't understand it. sounds like somebody is getting thrown under the boss. mr. morell, when one of the survivors, cia personnel survivors who is growing to retire, leave the cia, you know what they told me? they told me they were leaving the cia because they don't want to be left to die again.

okay? and that upsets me and i think it should upset you. that's the way they feel. >> if that's the way they feel it upsets me. >> so here's another problem with this. as it relates to the personnel, so the cia personnel, they have the right to make a complaint with the oig. >> uh-huh. >> right? there were oig complaints filed as related to these benghazi attacks, weren't there? >> i'm not aware. >> you're not aware that there, that there were complaints filed to the oig? jon: well the fireworks continue on capitol hill. congressman devin nunez of california there, talking with mike morell, the former cia director, about what happened the night of the benghazi attacks. a night when apparently cia officials on the ground in benghazi said this was not caused by some kind of a

protests. analysts at cia headquarters later said it was. that is part of the confusion. jenna: we're nearly three hours in. thanks for joining us on "happening now." we'll have continuing coverage after the break. "america's news headquarters" will pick it up. across america, people like basketball hall of famer

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which may cause kidney problems. if your pill isn't giving you the control you need, ask your doctor about non-insulin victoza. it's covered by most health plans. 1:00 in new york. 1:00 in washington. foxnews alert. former acting cia boss. mike morel, taking heated and pointed question on the hill. a brand-new hour of "hq." welcome. >> hi, i'm sandra smith. the fireworks on whether mr. mo morrell bowed to pressure on the attacks that took four american lives. let's get back to michele bachmann asking questions. >> if we don't take the totality of the information about