Homeland Security

The developers of a controversial video game about Guantanamo Bay have pulled the plug on the project after complaints from veterans group.

The game, called "Rendition: Guantanamo," would have simulated a detainee escaping the facility by fighting his way through mercenary guards. Moazzam Begg, a former Guantanamo prisoner, was helping the company reconstruct the prison for a virtual environment.

Vets for Freedom, a group lobbying against the game, complained that Begg was a terrorist who was released for bureaucratic reasons.

More from the Washington Times:

A statement released after T-Enterprise killed the game Wednesday, said "first and foremost, the main character was NOT Moazzam Begg," which contradicts what the BBC News reported in May after an interview with Zarrar Chishti, the director of T-Enterprise.

In the BBC report, Mr. Chishti said Mr. Begg was not only going to help with the design of the prison for the game, but also that "Moazzam will do three days of sound with us then we will 3D-render him into the game."

Mr. Hegseth said he is proud of his organization's efforts to stop "Rendition: Guantanamo," but he thinks there is a continuing "problem of perception" regarding Gitmo.

"We need to keep on guys like Moazzam Begg and what they are trying to do in rewriting history at Guantanamo: That our troops are oppressors and that the detainees are all victims," he said.

Republicans don't plan on forgetting about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's (D-Calif.) allegation two weeks ago that the CIA had misled Congress, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Calif.) made clear on Tuesday.

After a recess week that took Pelosi to China and saw a Supreme Court nomination dominate the news, Boehner signaled that the GOP still hopes to press Pelosi on her words about the intelligence agency.

Ten days ago, Speaker Pelosi not only refused to back up her accusations against our intelligence professionals, but she actually stood by her comments that they have repeatedly lied to her and lied to Congress," Boehner said, reiterating his call for the creation of a bipartisan select committee to investigate Pelosi's claims.

"Let's be clear, these are serious allegations. Not providing proof to back them up is an affront to our intelligence professionals," Boehner continued. "And I'm disappointed that House Democrats continue to stonewall this investigation."

Pelosi had found herself roiled in a small political controversy after making her allegation, on which Republicans quickly pounced two weeks ago.

Boehner indicated the GOP will not let the issue go anytime soon.

"My colleagues and I are prepared to continue to press this issue until it is resolved," he said.

Maintaining support for the domestic auto industry is a critical national security issue, Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) asserted Thursday.

"I don't see this as being a Democrat-or-Republican issue," Kucinich said of the auto industry's health during an appearance on Bloomberg News, "I see it as a national security issue."

"America has to have the capacity to make the cars, steel, aerospace, and to make ships -- otherwise we can't defend this country," the Cleveland-based Democrat explained. "And somehow, that's not even being included in the discussion."

Kucinich's district is one of many in the rust belt affected by the downturn in auto manufacturing. President Obama's cabinet members will visit Cleveland and other Midwest cities next week.

Kucinich also urged Obama to become more involved in GM and Chrysler's day-to-day operations, so that the companies would better favor workers.

"I'm not for the government running these industries," he said. "But I'll tell you one thing: if we own it, we ought to be running it," he added of the companies.

"And we ought to be running it in the interest of the American workers and the American taxpayers," Kucinich continued. "The administration has a responsibility to get involved in the day to day operations."

The division of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that issued warnings about "right-wing extremists" is "out of control," the top House Republican on the Homeland Security Committee warned Tuesday.

Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) said DHS's Homeland Environment Threat Analysis
Division must be subject to a wide-ranging inquiry into the controversial report warning that veterans or pro-life politicos may pose a domestic security risk.

"So it certainly seems to be a unit that's out of control," King said during an appearance on Fox News. "So that's why I went ahead with the resolution of inquiry."

King chided Democrats on the Homeland Security Committee who had initially blocked an inquiry, but have relented to King's requests in recent days.

"This will show whether or not the secretary is sincere when she says she wants to find out what happened and she wants to make sure it doesn't happen again," King said of DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano.

King said that Republicans couldn't take the secretary at her word when she said she will change policy at DHS, and that a report would force her to lay out her actions to rectify the report.

The fourth-ranking House Democrat vehemently backed Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) Monday, asserting there is no chance at all that there will be a change in Democrats' leadership.

"The Democratic Caucus stands firmly behind Nancy Pelosi, as does Steny Hoyer stand with her," House Democratic Caucus Chairman John Larson (D-Conn.) said during an appearance on MSNBC.

When asked if there would be any change in the Democratic leadership over Pelosi's accusations that the CIA misled Congress in intelligence briefings, Larson said, "No. None whatsoever."

"I mean, she has done an outstanding job moving this nation forward, working directly with Barack Obama," Larson continued. "That's the important thing. Only inside the Beltway is this a distraction."

The Connecticut lawmaker's comments are maybe the strongest to back Pelosi after she's fallen under Republican scrutiny in recent weeks.

"Believe me when I say this: Nancy Pelosi is not in any trouble," Larson added. "If anything, the wagons are circling more around the speaker during this time."

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee (R) penned a poem for his website in which the potential 2012 presidential candidate calls on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to resign.

In a poem entitled "Fancy Nancy," Huckabee calls the speaker "ruthless," and accuses her of "trashing" intelligence officials.

The poem might actually mark the most high-profile call for Pelosi's job in the wake of her accusation last week that the CIA had deliberately misled congressional officials the past eight years during routine intelligence briefings. Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) had called for Pelosi to step down from her speakership, but no Republican has gone on the record to call for her outright resignation.

Huckabee's poem concludes:

If forced to believe whether the CIA and her colleagues in Congress are lying;
Or it's Speaker Pelosi whose credibility and career is dying.
I believe in the integrity of the men and women who sacrifice to keep us safe;
Not the woman who has been caught flat-footed, lying to our face.

I say it here and I say it rather clear-
It's time for Nancy Pelosi to resign and get out of here.

The Bush administration consistently violated the law requiring the White House to keep the intelligence committees in Congress fully informed, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) insinuated Friday.

Wyden appeared on MSNBC to defend House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's (D-Calif.) claims that the CIA had misled Congress in its intelligence briefings, and alleged that the previous administration had failed to comply with laws on briefings.

"I can't speculate on what Nancy Pelosi was told at that time," Wyden said. "What I can tell you is there is a 1947 law that says all the members of the Intelligence Committee must be kept currently and fully informed, and the Bush administration consistently didn't comply with that law."

(A background on that law and congressinal briefings can be found here.)

Wyden sought to redirect some of the heat now on Pelosi against the Bush administration, accusing them of falling short in their obligation to members of Congress, including Pelosi.

Wyden said that some lawmakers had actually written the Bush administration as early as 2006 to register their displeasure in U.S. interrogation tactics, a letter which he said they hope to declassify.

The Oregon Democrat also said he agreed with former Vice President Cheney's demands that Bush-era memos on interrogation programs should be declassified.

"I will tell you, I find it hard to believe why the vice president is so convinced that those documents support his position," Wyden said. "But as far as I'm concerned, most of that information ought to be declassified so we can get beyond this 'he said, she said' business."

House Democrats should choose a new leader in the wake of current Speaker Nancy Pelosi's (D-Calif.) allegations that the CIA misled Congress in intelligence briefings, a House Republican said Friday.

"This is an enemy of national security that holds the gavel of the Speaker of the House, and now she's accusing the CIA, the people that have kept us safe over all these years to be a group of liars who willfully and calculatingly lied to the United States Congress," Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) said during an appearance this morning on Fox News.

"It is outrageous, and the American people need to speak to their Democrat members of Congress and ask them to come up with a new speaker," King added.

Pelosi has been under siege from Republicans who have accused her of distorting the extent to which she was briefed on the treatment and tactics used on terrorist detainees. The GOP has also targeted the speaker for her Thursday comments indicating that the CIA had lied to Congress.

King's statements mark the first time a House member has called for Pelosi to step down from her position as leader of the House and the third in line to the presidency.

Pelosi told CNBC yesterday that her leadership has "absolutely not" been harmed by the kerfuffle over the briefings.

The Senate Intelligence Committee's top Republican castigated House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) for committing a "massive attack" on the CIA yesterday.

Sen. Kit Bond (R-Mo.) said that Pelosi's claims that the CIA misled members of Congress in intelligence briefings was "unbelievable."

"I think it's a tragedy that we are seeing this massive attack on an intelligence community that has kept us safe," Bond said during an appearance Friday morning on NBC's "Today Show."

Bond called claims that the CIA would mislead or lie to Congress "unbelievable," and asserted that the documents he'd seen from earlier in the decade indicated that Pelosi had been fully briefed on the practices used by U.S. interrogators.

Bond also argued that Pelosi could have done something to stop the policy if she wanted.

"We have been advised of things that were contemplated that we thought were wrong, and when we objected, they dropped them," Bond said. "There's a whole list of things, and she did none of them that I'm aware of."

Watch a video of the interview below:

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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) denied Thursday her leadership has been threatened over questions about the extent of her knowledge of the CIA's interrogation tactics for terrorist detainees.

Pelosi told CNBC in an interview to air tonight that the situation has "absolutely not" hurt her leadership after having asserted earlier today that the CIA had lied to Congress in its briefings.

"But, you know, the Republicans are having their fun," Pelosi said before blaming the GOP for developing the very policies on which the speaker has denied being briefed beyond a single meeting in 2002.

"They conceived, developed and implemented techniques that were counter to our beliefs as a country," Pelosi said.

"Karl Rove is going to say what Karl Rove has said, so why even go there?" she asked, referencing the former Bush political guru's suggestion that Pelosi had been an "accomplice to torture."

She also downplayed comedian Jon Stewart's grilling of Congress on the issue on the "Daily Show."

"Jon Stewart, I'm a big fan, I watch him every night and mocking Congress is just stock and trade of what many of those shows do," Pelosi said.