After months of refusing demands to turn over her personal email server, Hillary Clinton has agreed to do so. The server will be turned over to the Justice Department as part of the investigation into her use of a private email account as Secretary of State. It was also disclosed that at least two emails on the unsecured server were classified “Top Secret, Sensitive Compartmented Information” — one of the government’s highest classifications. Some of the information is reportedly linked to NSA/satellite intelligence and the Inspector General says that there was material that was classified at the time it was sent over the unsecured server.
We have been following the story as it has transformed from a purely political to a potentially criminal matter. While Clinton has insisted that there was nothing classified on her email system and that any dispute is just a bureaucratic squabble “between agencies” the classification of many of these emails is no surprise to many of us who regularly deal with classified material. The classification of these emails will likely reignite demands for Clinton to turn over the server and raise the question of those thousands of emails that Clinton’s aides unilaterally deleted before turning over emails to the government. The classification level however of most of these messages are at the lowest level of such designations.
Clinton continues to stress that she did not send or receive any material marked classified. I have previously discussed why that explanation is less than compelling, particularly for anyone who has handled sensitive or classified material. As I discussed earlier, virtually anything coming out of the office of the Secretary of State would be considered classified as a matter of course. I have had a TS/SCI clearance since Reagan due to my national security work and have lived under the restrictions imposed on email and other systems. The defense is that this material was not technically classified at the time that it was sent. Thus it was not “classified” information. The problem is that it was not reviewed and classified because it was kept out of the State Department system. Moreover, most high-level communications are treated as classified and only individually marked as classified when there is a request for disclosure. You do not generate material as the Secretary of State and assume that it is unclassified. You are supposed to assume and treat it as presumptively classified. Otherwise, there would be massive exposure of classified material and willful blindness as to the implications of the actions of persons disregarding precautions. For example, there is not a person standing next to the President with a classification stamp in the Oval Office. However, those communications are deemed as presumptively classified and are not disclosed absent review. Under the same logic, the President could use a personal email system because his text messages by definition are not marked as classified. This is the whole reason that Clinton and others were told to use the protected email system run by the State Department. We have spent hundreds of millions of dollars to secure such systems.
Clinton portrayed the dispute as entirely removed from her controversial decision to use a personal server — a move that gave her total control of the server and ultimately allowed her staff to delete thousands of emails before turning over emails to the State Department: “They can fight over it or argue over it. That’s up to them. I can tell you what the facts are.”
Dozens of emails have now been declared classified. Clinton’s refusal to turn over the server has become more and more problematic, even for some of her supporters on the Hill. The FBI recently contacted her counsel, David Kendall, regarding three thumb drives believed to contain classified material. What is particularly interesting is the statement from Senator Grassley this week that the inspector general of the nation’s intelligence community had reported that at least four emails were classified when they were sent and two were TS/SCI classified. That would directly contradict Clinton’s position and would fuel questions about the tens of thousands of emails that Clinton reportedly ordered deleted rather than turn over to the State Department.
The inspector general for the intelligence community reportedly told Congress that potentially hundreds of classified emails are among the cache that Clinton provided to the State Department.
In the meantime, Judge Emmet G. Sullivan has issued an order to the State Department to ask Clinton, Huma Abedin and Cheryl Mills not to destroy any emails. Neither Abedin nor Mills provided a certification under penalty of perjury as Sullivan had requested in an earlier order. Some sites have reported that attorneys for Mills had indicated that she was going to delete copies of emails. A letter from her counsel quoted in the filing stated “Ms. Mills does not believe that she has paper copies of potential records in her possession. Following our production on August 10, 2015 [of the defense counsel’s version of the electronic records], we have instructed her to delete any and all electronic records in her possession.” Presumably, the State Department will convey the request of the Court to Mills’ counsel and no deletions or further deletions will occur.
With these developments, it is not a surprise to see the two leading contenders for the Democratic nomination objecting the delay in any debates with Clinton and the limitation of the number of those debates. Supporters for Martin O’Malley and fellow candidate Bernie Sanders have objected to what they see as a process shaped by Clinton supporters in the highest ranks of the party. The thought of Clinton being pulled into a debate in the midst of this scandal is clearly not something that the campaign would want. There is also a clear desire to limit the number and exposure of the debates.
It is interesting to see the different approaches of the parties. The GOP has more debates expected and a far larger and more diverse pool of candidates. Many democrats and independents seem to be chaffing at the limited choices in the Democratic race and the view of Clinton (and Bush on the GOP side) as favorites in another Clinton-Bush contest. With all of these political and legal elements, this campaign is proving a bit less predictable than forecasted by political commentators.
Mr. Turley how old is the picture with the article?
So what and BFD. Let it go folks and get a life.
As for use of her own server for certain emails, it sounds like a smart idea given what we now know about security of government data bases, political spying, government surveillance and law enforcement. Time to stop being controlled by IT departments and personnel. The Secretary of State or any other cabinet official should have the right to do what he or she damn well pleases and be allowed to use their own best judgment at the time rather than be second-guessed years down the line over stuff like this.
I’m beginning to think that the Donald Trump approach might be what is needed to put priorities in order.
If the computer company automatically backed up her server and still has the tapes, this could be the end of Hillary Clinton. Personally, I want to see those ‘personal’ emails. You can tell a lot about a person from their personal email.
Well one thing is certain, there are no heroes this time around. The next President will be the least tainted but hopefully the most competent and capable of steering the course to a better America. Line them all up and the least potentially damaging is Clinton. Listen to the others and factor in the machinery and the computer will spit out 8 years of a Democratic President with hopefully some of those years with a Democrat majority in the Congress and/or the Senate.
The alternative(s), well we have already been there and it was more than stupid, it was shameful.
And here’s Nick.
I do not trust the FBI with her emails. Or the NSA. Or the CIA. Or Congress. But when she complains about the bathrooms when she goes to Congress to testify I think that she should make her complaints public. She is an ugly thing and I think that the civil rule should bar any more photos. It is too early in the morning to look at those photos. My laptop shudders when I stop the screen on such photos. So the election will be Trump and Biden. Just so you know. My half blind guy heard about the fix when he was in Washington DC last week and attended a cathouse.
Trump Trump bo bump, bananna fanna fo fump, fee fi mo mump, TRUMP!
I wouldn’t be surprised if the FBI forensics unit finds evidence of several low level wipes of free space and defragmentation on the disk drives, or possibly a swapped hard drive. Wiping of free space is used to cover latent magnetic images of deleted files. If this is found to be the case it might be indicative of evidence tampering.
Thankfully, these emails could have proof of Hillary eating recently aborted black fetuses while laughing about the deaths in Benghazi, and much of this nation will *still* vote for her.
But say, what about Caitlyn Jenner? Isn’t there someone still hating on her that needs a swift and censorious internet shaming by a leftist mob?
We certainly have two different Americas. This whole saga is theater of the absurd; who would ever be seriously considered STILL eligible for POTUS given this woman’s history? We can discuss her but we should be really discussing the voters that consider her Presidential. OMG!!!
Interesting to see what turns up
The Science Geek
http://www.thesciencegeek.org
“Top secret” emails were found on Clinton’s server. FBI will try to recover the deleted emails.
Possible tie in to Clinton Foundation donors. Clinton lawyerd up. Let’s see what the FBI finds.
At this point, what difference does it make? Her people have already sanitized and patched it, possibly even changing the software / OS load-out, by this point.
None of you who are so fixated upon legal recourse being the only recourse are ever going to touch Hillary.
Have Clinton’s attorney and the individuals at the colorado company who handled the server and/or emails signed the appropriate non-disclosure agreements? Do they have security clearances? And do they have the appropriate physical security to handle sensitive data? You can’t give sensitive data (never mind classified) to anyone. Another reason why the server should never have been in her personal possession. If under control of the State Department, any problems would have been handled by its IT department.
I don’t know what the complaints are about. This just proves she’ll be as transparent as the current president is when she’s appointed president.
“Why not ask the Chinese for a copy of the deleted emails.”
Why not ask NSA for a copy of the deleted emails? They have everybody else’s emails.
Before any of you liberal sympathizers say past SOS have done this, be sure to prove they had their own “private” server first.
http://www.tpnn.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Hillary-Clinton.gif
Reblogged this on Scoop Feed.
Is Hillary hiding embarrassing personal information or evidence of criminal activity. Will we ever know? I expect that if we do find out that Martha Stewart will be advising this vile woman on prison etiquette.
Why not ask the Chinese for a copy of the deleted emails.
The FBI visited the computer company in Denver that sold the Clinton’s the server yesterday. They may have ALL the emails backed up.
Arrogance and ignorance. This “Smartest woman in the world” knows nothing about computers and technology. And Bubba doesn’t either.
“FEEL THE BERN!” Or, Crazy Joe?