Foreign Affairs

GOP Lawmakers Move To Hold Blinken In Contempt After He Skips Afghanistan Withdrawal Hearing

Secretary of State Antony Blinken (Screen Capture/CSPAN)

A House panel moved to hold Secretary of State Antony Blinken in contempt after he skipped a Tuesday congressional hearing on the chaotic 2021 Afghanistan withdrawal, despite being legally compelled to testify.

Blinken was subpoenaed to testify about the Afghanistan withdrawal, which ended in the deaths of 13 U.S. servicemembers and thousands of Americans initially stranded in the country, before the House Foreign Affairs Committee (HFAC) on Tuesday, but decided not to attend, leading committee Republicans to vote to hold him in contempt of Congress, according to Axios.

The vote passed on Tuesday in a narrow 26-25 vote, Axios reported.

“I wish we were not here today. However, Secretary of State Antony Blinken brought this upon himself,” HAFC Chairmain Rep. Michael McCaul said during the Tuesday hearing.

In a May 22 budget hearing, CHM @RepMcCaul was clear: he expected @SecBlinken to testify before the committee in September on his Afghanistan report.

September is nearly over, and Blinken refuses to spend a few hours on the Hill. His public schedule was wide open this morning. pic.twitter.com/wQXde1aPKN

— House Foreign Affairs Committee Majority (@HouseForeignGOP) September 24, 2024

Blinken decided to skip the hearing because he wanted to be present in meetings at the United Nations (UN) General Assembly in New York this week, according to Politico. Blinken told McCaul in a letter last week that he was “profoundly disappointed” that the committee did not accept “several reasonable alternatives to the dates unilaterally demanded by the Committee during which I am carrying out the President’s important foreign policy objectives.”

“Today’s action by the House Committee on Foreign Affairs was a naked political exercise masquerading as oversight, designed only to further the majority’s partisan interests under the guise of asking questions that have long ago been answered,” a State Department spokesman told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

“I believe you would agree U.S. representation at the highest levels in these engagements is essential,” Blinken told McCaul in the letter, referring to the UN General Assembly.

But Blinken was offered multiple dates to appear before the committee aside from Tuesday, the Daily Caller News Foundation has learned. Blinken also wasn’t scheduled for public appearances in New York until 1:30 p.m. on Tuesday; the HAFC hearing was at 10 a.m.

A source with direct knowledge of the matter told the DCNF that the State Department has repeatedly mischaracterized the committee’s efforts to bring Blinken in to testify.

The State Department, and more broadly, the Biden administration, have widely been blamed for the disastrous nature of the Afghanistan withdrawal. A failure of planning in Washington and a misguided prediction that the Taliban wouldn’t take over Afghanistan so quickly contributed to the chaotic operation.

A 2023 State Department After-Action report found that the withdrawal was also hindered by the fact that it was unclear who in the Department had the lead,” further noting that there was an “insufficient senior-level consideration of worst-case scenarios.”

No one inside the administration was fired or resigned over their role in the withdrawal. After the withdrawal ended, President Joe Biden reportedly told those in his close orbit that he supported them and stood by their decisions during the operation, according to Axios.

“There wasn’t even a real possibility of a shake-up,” a U.S. official told Axios in February.

Blinken recently signaled that he has no interest in staying in his role past January — the end of Biden’s sole term — or serving under a possible Kamala Harris administration.

“As to my own future, all I’m looking at right now is the balance of this administration and January,” Blinken said at a press conference in early September.

Editor’s Note: This article has been updated to include a statement from a State Department spokesman.