State Department

Another Benghazi in the Making?

UPDATED 6:39 AM EDT, June 12, 2013 | BY Sara Carter

The State Department is failing to adequately protect U.S. diplomats in Beirut, leaving them without necessary counterterrorism training and serving in a decrepit, aged embassy compound that fails to meet security protocols, according to an internal investigation that raises new questions about the Obama administration's commitment to protecting Americans overseas in the aftermath of the Benghazi tragedy.

»MORE
UPDATED 17:19 PM EST, February 25, 2013

Embassies Exposed

U.S. embassies and diplomatic outposts have skipped or exempted themselves from security requirements without the knowledge of the State Department in Washington, creating an ad hoc system so riddled with exceptions that the agency’s internal watchdog is raising new safety alarms just months after the deadly attack on the Benghazi consulate.

»MORE
UPDATED 22:21 PM EST, January 22, 2013

Congress Confronts Clinton

Congressional investigators have pieced together a series of decisions that led State Department officials to inexplicably draw down security in Libya last year even as threats and attacks against Western diplomats were rising in the violent, chaotic city of Benghazi where America’s ambassador was killed last Sept. 11.

»MORE
UPDATED 7:49 AM EST, January 22, 2013

Ambassador's final warning on Benghazi

Just hours before he died in a terrorist attack at the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Ambassador Chris Stevens sent a cable to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton painting a chaotic, violent portrait of the eastern Libya city and warning that local militias were threatening to pull the security they afforded U.S. officials.

»MORE
UPDATED 0:06 AM EST, November 30, 2012

USA: Uncle Sam's Advertising

The government has spent more than $16 billion over the last decade on outside advertising, marketing and public relations contractors, feeding a cottage industry of inside-the-Beltway and Madison Avenue firms that help federal agencies burnish their images and tailor their messages, an investigation by the Washington Guardian and Northwestern University's Medill News Service has found.

»MORE
UPDATED 23:10 PM EDT, October 18, 2012

Energy Diplomacy

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Thursday called for her successor to pursue the twin goals of stable, affordable energy and the growth of renewable sources in future diplomacy.

Clinton said the United States must remain a world leader in the energy markets, with the top objective of making sure "the American people's access to energy is secure, reliable, affordable and sustainable." On the last note, she said global development of renewable energy sources is key to confronting climate change.

»MORE
UPDATED 23:43 PM EDT, October 14, 2012

'An Unprecedented Attack'

State Department officials said Wednesday that security levels at the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, were adequate for the threat level on the anniversary of 9/11 but that the compound was overrun by an "unprecedented attack" by dozens of heavily armed extremists.

»MORE

Guardian Exclusives

James Clapper wins a Whopper for his 'least untruthful' testimony to Congress about the extent of the government's collection of phone and e-mail records
How an effort to integrate Afghan forces gave the Taliban the chance to unleash the newest lethal threat to U.S. troops
Facebook founder launches political group, focuses first on immigration policy debate
CFTC is asking Congress for more money, even as it lavishes employees with six-figure salaries, bonuses and even gift cards