Republicans call pre-holiday release of report on Afghanistan withdrawal 'typical DC swamp tactic'

House Republicans on Friday accused President Joe Biden and his administration of releasing a report on the Afghanistan pullout in 2021 just before the July 4th holiday so they could bury it.

House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul (R-TX) said:

On April 25, I called upon the State Department to declassify its After-Action Review on Afghanistan within 60 days. The department failed to fulfill that request, instead choosing to release only a small portion of that document – 24 of 87 pages that were already unclassified – and completely omitted the narrative which forms the bulk of the report. There is no reason not to produce a declassified version of the full report, as much of it is marked ‘Sensitive but Unclassified’ or ‘Unclassified.’ This is another blatant attempt to hide the Biden administration’s culpability in the chaotic and deadly evacuation from Afghanistan.

House Armed Services Readiness Subcommittee Chairman and Green Beret soldier Mike Waltz also tweeted, “Shameful the Biden Administration would release a damning report on Afghanistan the Friday afternoon of a holiday weekend. Typical DC swamp tactic. Like other Afghanistan-related documents, much of this report remains unnecessarily classified to avoid future embarrassment, transparency, and accountability."

Reporters (for once) pressed White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre about the report on Friday when it was released, but as usual, she sidestepped their questions.

She first referred them to the State Department, and then said, “I will just let it speak for itself. I’m just not going to comment further.”

The report stated that Biden and former President Donald Trump were both to blame for the disastrous pullout. There was confusion about who was in charge and a lack of planning to make it successful, it said.