White House won’t say whether Clinton broke law with personal emails

by Ben Kamisar - 03/03/15 3:51 PM ET

The White House defended its policy allowing administration officials to use their personal emails amidst the controversy over Monday’s revelation that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton exclusively used her personal address for official business.

{mosads}Press secretary Josh Earnest wouldn’t say whether the White House believes Clinton broke any federal transparency laws and stressed that the decision is up to the State Department’s lawyers. But he did say that if Clinton’s team is correctly describing its efforts, she’d be in the clear.

“If, in fact, what Secretary Clinton’s team said they were going to do, they did, and that can be verified by the State Department, who is responsible for maintaining these records, that would be entirely consistent with what the Federal Records Act requires,” Earnest said at a press briefing Tuesday.

“The policy, as a general matter, allows individuals to use their personal email address as long as those emails are maintained and sent to the State Department. … Secretary Clinton’s team has indicated that they complied with that guidance.”

The New York Times reported Monday that Clinton’s team sent State 55,000 pages of emails two months ago that it deemed part of official business after the State Department requested her official emails. The report says her team took “no action” to hand those emails over to the State Department while she was in office.

Nick Merrill, a Clinton spokesman, said in an email that she followed “the letter and spirit of the rules” by adequately preserving the emails.

The State Department requested Clinton’s emails after Congress amended the Federal Records Act in 2014 to specifically prohibit the use of non-official email addresses unless messages are copied to an official address within 20 days.

While Clinton stepped down in 2013, before the act became law, a State Department spokeswoman told reporters that the agency requested that former secretaries submit all of their official records to preserve.

Earnest said that the majority of Clinton’s emails appeared to be sent to official State Department addresses, which are automatically preserved.

The issue has dominated the news Tuesday, and Republicans have used the moment to criticize the presumed front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination. Michael Short, a spokesman with the Republican National Committee, said the revelations shore up the feeling that Clinton has “something to hide.” And the group released an online video showing various media personalities slamming Clinton.

Tags 2016 Hillary Clinton Josh Earnest