3,000pages late to goal
State Department says 65 of the messages are confidential, one secret.
washington » The State Department released an additional 3,000 pages of e- mails from former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s private e- mail account Friday, missing a court- ordered goal for their production by a week.
The department said the documents include 65 messages containing information subsequently deemed “confidential,” the lowest classification. One document contained information determined to now be “secret,” although itwas not identified as such at the time it was sent.
The latest release brings the department into compliance with a court order that demands production of the e- mails on a rolling monthly basis in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. The department has released 82 percent, or 43,148, of the 55,000 pages of e- mails Clinton turned over after she left office.
In one e- mail chain, top aide Jake Sullivan sentClinton a memo from a State Department staffer with his thoughts on Libya policy that Sullivan found impressive. Clinton didn’t recognize the staffer’s name and asked where he worked. When Sullivan replied that he worked for the State Department, Clinton wrote, “I was surprised that he used personal e- mail account if he is at State.”
Another exchange raised questions about Clinton’s desire to use unsecured email when a secure fax wasn’t possible.
On June 17, 2011, Clinton repeatedly sought “talking points” for a phone conversation she had scheduled later in the day with Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin of Maryland. The subject was the late Russian accountant Sergei Magnitsky, who exposed massive corruption before dying in his prison cell after alleged mistreatment.
Sullivan reported “issues sending secure fax,” prompting Clinton to reply that if they couldn’t send it by fax, they should “turn it into nonpaper w/ no identifying heading and send nonsecure.”
Nonpaper is a term that refers to an informal document without official markings like letterhead or logos and that is not saved for records.
Alegislative aide familiar with the Clinton- Cardin call recalled no classified elements to the conversation.
The aide said the discussion mainly focused on the form of a new “Magnitsky law” being worked on in Congress that would target Russian human rights abusers, and concerns among some Obama administration officials about how sanctionswould be applied.
The aide wasn’t authorized to speak publicly on the matter and demanded anonymity. By later that afternoon, the secure fax apparentlyworked, according to the messages.