Two Brothers at Center of Benghazi Controversy: One Runs CBS News, the Other Is Obama’s Adviser

5/3/14
 
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from Heritage Foundation,
5/1/14:

The disclosure this week of a White House document on Benghazi has thrust CBS News into the spotlight for its coverage in the aftermath of the terrorist attack.

CBS News President David Rhodes is the brother of Ben Rhodes, the White House deputy national security adviser who drafted the newly released document about Benghazi just days after the Sept. 11, 2012, attack that killed four Americans. Ben Rhodes’s involvement was first revealed Tuesday when Judicial Watch obtained the document as part of a court case.

Last night, “CBS Evening News” did not cover the latest developments on the story, even though reporters peppered White House press secretary Jay Carney with questions earlier in the day.

The Washington Free Beacon reports CBS was the only evening newscast not to cover the latest details on Benghazi. The program instead covered “the weather, Oklahoma executions, and the arrest of a former Irish Republican Army operative.”

Earlier yesterday, Glenn Beck interviewed Sharyl Attkisson, a former CBS News investigative reporter, about the Benghazi disclosure and the Rhodes brothers. Attkisson revealed that she sought the same Ben Rhodes document that Judicial Watch eventually obtained. CBS News, however, would not take the matter to court.

“CBS wasn’t willing to file a [Freedom of Information Act] lawsuit when I was there to try to get some of these documents,” Attkisson said.

She continued: “Of course I knew about the relationship between Ben Rhodes, the assistant to the president, and the president of CBS News. And there had been a little bit of reporting … involving Rhodes and some of the talking point matters, so I wasn’t terribly surprised. But I was glad to see written documentation that sheds a little more light on all of this.”

Attkisson resigned from CBS News in March. Among the reasons cited: a lack of support for her investigative reporting on Benghazi and other Obama administration scandals.

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