Clinton (Gary Cameron/Reuters)
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will return to work next week, her spokesman said, following a stomach virus that caused her to faint and suffer a concussion, which kept her from her official duties for three weeks.
"The Secretary continues to recuperate at home," spokesman Philippe Reines emailed reporters. "She had long planned to take this holiday week off, so she had no work schedule. She looks forward to getting back to the office next week and resuming her schedule."
The virus and subsequent concussion led Clinton to cancel her highly anticipated congressional testimony Dec. 20 on the Sept. 11, 2012, attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and 3 other diplomats. The administration has been roundly criticized by Republicans and others for how the attack was reported to the public and whether consulate security prior to the attack was adequate.
The politically charged subject matter of Clinton's testimony led some critics to accuse her of faking her illness.
"I’m not a doctor, but it seems as though that the secretary of state has come down with a case of Benghazi flu,” blunt-talking outgoing Rep. Allen West (R-Fla.) said on Fox News last week. Other conservative media outlets and figures issued similar criticisms.
Former U.S. ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton referred to her illness as a "diplomatic illness" during a television interview, and the New York Post blasted her decision in an editorial.
Clinton is expected to testify in January. No details have been publicly released regarding scheduling.