Did Obama deflect his responsibility for the Benghazi attack?

>> after taking responsibility for the security failures surrounding the attack on the u.s. consulate in libya, secretary clinton 's comments on the eve of the presidential debate in long island caused an uproar among republicans who say the buck should stop with the president in the oval office . joining me senator kelly ayotte who lreleased a statement accusing the president of deflecting his responsibility. thanks for joining us from new hampshire. what is wrong with secretary clinton saying -- good to have you with us. what is wrong with secretary clinton saying i'm in charge of 60,000 people who work for the state department and even if mid-level bureaucrats made those decisions it's ultimately my responsibility as secretary of state?

>> well certainly laudable that the secretary of state has come forward like this, but she's clearly trying to be loyal and cover for the president and the vice president. ultimately the security of the american people is the president's responsibility. and andrea, let's look at all the changing stories here of what the american people have been told about this event. it was certainly the administration that sent susan rice on every sunday talk show , every major station, to say this was a spontaneous reaction to a video. seven days after this event the president himself went on david letterman and still stuck to that saying it was a reaction to the video. yet the next day, the director of national intelligence testified before congress it was a terrorist event. secretary clinton can come forward and take responsibility, but the president has to answers you questions about this because first of all, there were two prior attacks on our consulate, the second one in june, according to one witness blew a hole that 40 people could go through, a serious attack. what did the president know about this and why wasn't there action taken and if he didn't know about it we've got a serious problem with our intelligence team.

>> now in fairness, they did say and even susan rice said on that sunday, that they would wait the final review by the fbi, the investigations which have been --

>> andrea really, obviously you don't get on a sunday show and every major sunday show without the administration saying go on the show. she was very clear ambassador rice, she was asked whether it was a hostile event against our country and she said no. spontaneous reaction to a video. but then again, seven days later on david letterman the president reiterated that story. let's go back to the facts. two prior attacks on this consulate, think about requests for security that were denied, i think that this didn't fit the administration's narrative. we have one of two things happening, blatant incompetence or deliberate misleading of the american people and these are fair questions to ask.

>> do you expect mitt romney will be trying to bring this issue up if it doesn't get asked by one of the questioners at the town hall tonight.

>> i think that someone at the town hall will likely ask this. i mean this is an important issue. i don't know whether governor romney will bring this up or of course i'm sure it will come up in the foreign policy debate on 292nd. i really hope that we get answers from this administration soon because this is deeply troubling with the number of changing stories and, of course, it's horrible what happened in libya. we do need to get to the bottom of it. the american people deserve to have straight, forward the truth and if there's something wrong with our intelligence we better know and certainly why didn't the president receive this information about the prior attacks and did he receive it. question number one did he receive it in his dalingly briefings. if he didn't there's a real problem with this intelligence team.

>> thank you so much, senator kelly ayotte, joining us from new hampshire today.