Excerpt:
"I was supposed to meet with [Emerson] this afternoon," King tells National Review Online. "My staff has been in contact with him for the last six, seven weeks — getting information for the hearings, trying to plan a strategy. But at no time was it suggested that Emerson was going to be a witness."
Still, King says, Ben Smith's story appears to have "set Emerson off."
"I started getting calls from people — I got an e-mail from Andy McCarthy and spoke with Cliff May, who told me that the whole conservative community has gotten this e-mail from Emerson, and wondered what it was about. What Emerson is suggesting is that he was going to be a witness, then I got pressure from Muslim groups and backed down to Keith Ellison, or something — I have no idea what he is trying to suggest. But basically, he is saying that you can't have a real hearing on radicalization without Steve Emerson."
King disagrees with Emerson's assessment. "The idea was to make the hearings have an impact," he tells us. "With all due respect, whether it is Steve Emerson, or me, or [Daniel] Pipes, or[Frank] Gaffney, people have heard from us before — we are outsiders talking about the community. If I can get people from within the Muslim community to talk about the extent of radicalization, that is a lot more effective."