Obama team, GOP tangle over Libya report

BOCA RATON, Fla. -- In the hours leading up to tonight's foreign policy debate, President Obama's aides and a powerful Republican congressman are mixing it up over security in Libya.

Obama aides criticized Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, for releasing documents that include the names of Libyan nationals who are -- were? -- secretly cooperating with the United States on security issues.

"Jeopardizing their lives -- carelessly, recklessly putting them at risk -- all to score political points in the final weeks before an election," said Obama campaign senior adviser David Axelrod, speaking on NBC's Meet The Press. "That's disgraceful. The way they have handled this issue is disgraceful."

Issa, who has been investigating the Obama administration's handling of the attack Sept. 11 on a consulate in Benghazi, Libya, said in a statement that the president's campaign aides are the ones playing politics.

"Obama administration officials and their surrogates are clearly reeling from revelations about how the situation in Benghazi was mishandled and are falsely politicizing the issue in a last ditch effort to save President Obama's re-election effort," Issa said.

The Libya morass is sure to be a topic in tonight's foreign policy debate between Obama and Republican opponent Mitt Romney.

Issa's committee is investigating security at the Benghazi compound leading up to the attack that killed four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens.

The GOP is asking questions about changing stories on the origins of the attack -- first attributed to a protest over an anti-Islam film, then to a preplanned terrorist assault.

Obama officials said the story behind the attack changed as the evidence did, and President Obama has vowed to track down the killers.