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State Dept. inspector general report sharply criticizes Hillary Clinton's email practices

 
The State Department's independent watchdog has issued a highly critical analysis of Hillary Clinton's email practices while running the department, concluding that she failed to seek legal approval for her use of a private email server and that department staff would not have given its blessing because of the "security risks in doing so."  [Justin Sullivan | Getty Images]
The State Department's independent watchdog has issued a highly critical analysis of Hillary Clinton's email practices while running the department, concluding that she failed to seek legal approval for her use of a private email server and that department staff would not have given its blessing because of the "security risks in doing so." [Justin Sullivan | Getty Images]
Published May 25, 2016

WASHINGTON — The State Department's independent watchdog has issued a highly critical analysis of Hillary Clinton's email practices while running the department, concluding that she failed to seek legal approval for her use of a private email server and that department staff would not have given its blessing because of the "security risks in doing so."

The inspector general, in a long awaited review obtained Wednesday by the Washington Post in advance of its publication, found that Clinton's use of private email for public business was "not an appropriate method" of preserving documents and that her practices failed to comply with department policies meant to ensure that federal record laws are followed.

The report says Clinton, who is the Democratic presidential front-runner, should have printed and saved her emails during her four years in office or surrendered her work-related correspondence immediately upon stepping down in February 2013. Instead, Clinton provided those records in December 2014, nearly two years after leaving office.

The report found that a top Clinton aide was warned in 2010 that the system may not properly preserve records but dismissed those worries, indicating that the system passed legal muster. But the inspector general said it could not show evidence of a review by legal counsel.

A Clinton spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The 83-page report reviews email practices by five secretaries of state and generally concludes that record keeping has been spotty for years.

It was particularly critical of former secretary of state Colin Powell — who has acknowledged publicly that he used a personal email account to conduct business — concluding that he too failed to follow department policy designed to comply with public-record laws.

Mark Toner, a State Department spokesman, said the report underscores the need for federal agencies to adapt "decades-old record-keeping practices to the email-dominated modern era." He said it is clear from the report that the department could have preserved emails better under multiple secretaries of state but said that multiple improvements have been put in place under Secretary of State John F. Kerry to improve record retention.

The timing of the report is inconvenient for Clinton, who now faces an intense onslaught of attacks from presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.

But its release — as well as the conclusion of an ongoing FBI investigation — have also been seen for months by her allies as key milestones to finally putting the email issue to rest. They have worked to inoculate her against potentially critical findings, accusing the State Department's inspector general of working in concert with congressional Republicans to harm her presidential campaign and noting that a top inspector general official used to work for Sen. Charles E. Grassley, R-Iowa.

The inspector general has rejected allegations of bias, noting that the scope of the review encompasses secretaries of both parties and that it was undertaken at the direction of Clinton's Democratic successor, Kerry. The report includes interviews with Kerry and Powell and former secretaries Madeleine Albright and Condoleezza Rice, but it says that Clinton declined to be interviewed. The inspector general, Steve Linick, was appointed by President Barack Obama and has served since 2013.

The FBI investigation into whether Clinton mishandled classified material through her use of the private server in her home in suburban New York is still under way. FBI Director James B. Comey has said there is no "external deadline" for concluding that probe, but he acknowledged that there is pressure to wrap up the matter promptly and thoroughly.

Officials have said they plan to interview Clinton about the matter soon; she has expressed willingness to sit for such a session. They have also told the Post that their investigation so far has found little evidence that Clinton maliciously flouted classification rules.

About 2,000 chains of Clinton's correspondence include emails that the State Department has since said are classified. A Washington Post analysis found that Clinton herself wrote 104 of those notes. Others were written by about 300 other people, including longtime diplomats and top officials in the national security community.

The new report focuses on record keeping and how Clinton and previous secretaries of state maintained documents regarding public business. She has said she complied with laws requiring the preservation of documents, including emails, because she emailed other government officials at their official accounts, knowing their emails would be retained on public servers.

But she has not explained how she intended to preserve emails sent to private citizens, who did not use government email. Some emails have emerged, particularly from Clinton's first months in office in 2009, when her aides have said she was transitioning technology, that she did not provide to the State Department.

The inspector general cited those emails in concluding that Clinton's 2014 submission of what she characterized as all of her public records was "incomplete."

In December 2014, nearly two years after leaving office, she turned over more than 30,000 emails she said represented all of her work-related correspondence. She said that she also exchanged about 31,000 personal emails during her time as secretary and that those messages have been deleted.

Here are the most critical parts of the report on Hillary Clinton's email use

WASHINGTON — The State Department's independent watchdog released an 83-page report Wednesday to lawmakers concluding that Hillary Clinton's email practices did not comply with department policies. Below are some of the most revealing parts of the findings:

1. The report concludes that Clinton's use of a personal email account was "not an appropriate method." This knocks down a key argument made in Clinton's defense — that because she had emailed State Department officials on their government accounts, records of her communications were preserved:

At a minimum, Secretary Clinton should have surrendered all emails dealing with Department business before leaving government service and, because she did not do so, she did not comply with the Department's policies that were implemented in accordance with the Federal Records Act.

2. In January 2011, there were two hacking attempts on the Clinton email system in one day. An adviser to President Bill Clinton tried to shut down the server each time.

3. There were warnings issued to senior State Department officials that hackers were targeting personal email accounts. Below, an excerpt from a March 11, 2011, memo written by the assistant secretary of diplomatic security.

Threat analysis by the DS cyber security team and related incidents reports indicate a dramatic increase since January 2011 in attempts by [redacted] cyber actors to compromise the private home e-mail accounts of senior Department officials. … Although the targets are unclassified, personal e-mail accounts, the likely objective is to compromise user accounts and thereby gain access to police documents and personal information that could enable technical surveillance and possible blackmail. The personal e-mail of family members also is at risk.

4. The audit also covered Clinton's aides, some of whom did not cooperate when asked to respond to a questionnaire about email use. Some of the aides used their personal email accounts extensively for official business.

5. The package of emails turned over by Clinton was "incomplete."

For example, the Department and OIG both determined that the production included no email covering the first few months of Secretary Clinton's tenure — from January 21, 2009, to March 17, 2009, for received messages; and from January 21, 2009, to April 12, 2009, for sent messages.

6. IT security officials were concerned about Clinton's use of personal email and held meetings to discuss the need to preserve records and security. One staff member said the security director said the email system had been approved by state's legal staff. The IG did not find evidence that the department's legal adviser had reviewed or approved Clinton's email system.

Another staff member who raised issues was told that their mission was "to support the Secretary, and instructed the staff never to speak of the Secretary's personal email system again."

7. The report also criticizes Colin Powell's handling of official emails during his tenure as secretary of state, saying it was also "not an appropriate method" for preserving emails that are part of the federal record. When asked to defend her email system, Clinton has said that her predecessors also used personal accounts.

But the report also notes that by the time Clinton became secretary of state, the guidance on email use was much more detailed, suggesting that pointing to Powell is not an entirely fair comparison:

By Secretary Clinton's tenure, the Department's guidance was considerably more detailed and sophisticated…. Secretary Clinton's cybersecurity practices accordingly must be evaluated in light of these more comprehensive directives.