Iowa congressman Steve King, who joined fellow Republicans Rep. Michelle Bachman and Rep. Louis Gohmert in Egypt last week, where they delivered a televised message praising the Egyptian military’s crackdown on dissenters, claims that the group’s insistence that the Muslim Brotherhood was linked to the 9/11 terrorist attacks comes from a “very reliable” source “within the Middle East.” But he won’t say who his source is because “then it would be a political incident.”
The Bush administration’s 9/11 commission found no such link, except to note a handful of instances where Al Qaeda members had peripheral contact with the sprawling group.
While Bachmann has attempted to backtrack from the comments, King has characteristically doubled down.
The Omaha World-Herald reports:
Tuesday, during a call with reporters, King defended Bachmann’s statements.
King said he had received evidence tying the Muslim Brotherhood to both the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and last year’s attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya. He said his information comes from “very well-placed sources within the Middle East.”
Pressed for more details, King declined to specify even the country from which the information originated.
“That source is a very reliable source and it is very sensitive,” King said. “If I were to clarify the source of it, then it would be a political incident. And I’d just as soon not initiate that.”
Radio Iowa adds:
“I have received evidence that there was a foundation there among the Muslim Brotherhood in each of those cases and it’s not something that I think that they can just simply say is wrong. They would have to be the ones to prove the negative,” King said. “It takes a fair amount of self-confidence, sometimes misplaced self-confidence, to be so critical with a basis to do so.”
King was asked twice during his telephone news conference to reveal the source of his information.
“I think I’ll just stick with my answer of very well-placed sources within the Middle East,” King said, “and I think that it will be verified over time.”
