Sen. Paul: Haspel Should Brief Full Congress on Khashoggi

CIA Director Gina Haspel should have shared the agency's findings about the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, with Congress, not just leaders of multiple Senate committees, Sen. Rand Paul complained Tuesday.

"This is the very definition of the deep state," the Kentucky Republican, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, told Fox News' "America's Newsroom."  "The intelligence agencies do things conclude things, but then the elected officials are prevented from knowing about this."

Haspel Tuesday met with a small group of senators, including the chairmen and ranking senators on the key national security committees.

Last week, senators from both parties were angry because Haspel didn't attend a closed-door session with top administration officials about Khashoggi's killing and the U.S. response.

If lawmakers can't access what the intelligence community has determined then that makes it impossible to provide oversight, Paul argued.

There have been several reports that the CIA determined that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had been complicit in Khashoggi's murder, but the evidence behind that conclusion hasn't been released.

"The CIA director's coming to Capitol Hill today, and I'm still being excluded from hearing or seeing the evidence of the crown prince's involvement," Paul said.

Paul also said Defense Secretary James Mattis and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo should also be asked specifically if they agree with the CIA's conclusion, after they both said there is no "smoking gun" that proves the crown prince played a role in the death.

• WSJ: CIA Director Haspel Will Now Brief on Khashoggi Murder
• CNN: Chilling Messages From Khashoggi May Be Clues To His Killing