CBS News correspondent Lara Logan on Friday retracted and apologized for a ‘‘60 Minutes’’ report based on a supposed eyewitness to the terrorist attacks on the US diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya.
Logan, appearing on ‘‘CBS This Morning,’’ said the network was ‘‘misled’’ by the man, Dylan Davies, who told ‘‘60 Minutes’’ last week that he had witnessed the Sept. 11, 2012, attack that left four Americans dead, including US ambassador J. Christopher Stevens.
‘‘The most important thing to every person at ‘60 Minutes’ is the truth, and the truth is we made a mistake,’’ said a chastened Logan, who had reported the original story.
On the ‘‘60 Minutes’’ broadcast, Davies — who used the pseudonym Morgan Jones — described scaling the walls of the diplomatic facility and encountering several attackers, including one whom he said he disabled with a blow from his rifle butt. He also recounted his clandestine visit that night to a hospital to view Stevens’ body.
With it now unclear where Davies had been, publisher Simon & Schuster said Friday it was withdrawing his book, ‘‘The Embassy House: The Explosive Eyewitness Account of the Libyan Embassy Siege by the Soldier Who Was There.’’ It was published on the conservative Threshold Editions imprint two days after the ‘‘60 Minutes’’ story.
CBS has also admitted it was wrong not to have disclosed to ‘‘60 Minutes’’ viewers that Simon & Schuster, like CBS News, is owned by the CBS Corp.
The “60 Minutes” report helped fuel another round of GOP accusations against the State Department and the Obama administration over their account of the attack.
Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, said he would block confirmation of Obama’s nominees, including Jeh Johnson as homeland security secretary and Janet Yellen as head of the Federal Reserve, until the administration allowed government witnesses to the attack to appear before Congress.
The Washington Post raised questions about Davies’ account in an article published on Oct. 31, four days after the ‘‘60 Minutes’’ broadcast. The story noted that Davies gave his employer a different account of his experiences that night than the one he gave Logan on ‘‘60 Minutes,’’ the most prestigious newsmagazine show on television.
In a 2½-page incident report to Blue Mountain, the Britain-based contractor hired by the State Department to handle perimeter security at the compound, Davies said he spent most of that night at his Benghazi villa. ‘‘We could not get anywhere near [the diplomatic compound] . . . as roadblocks had been set up,’’ he wrote.
Logan said Friday morning that Davies had denied the report when CBS questioned him about it, and said he had told the FBI the same story he recounted on ‘‘60 Minutes.’’
Material from The Associated Press was used in this report.