Hillary used iPad for official emails at State

Hillary Clinton used an iPad and Blackberry to send official emails at the State Department despite her claim that she relied on a personal address to avoid the inconvenience of multiple devices, according to The Associated Press. 

The AP received four emails from a Freedom of Information Act request filed in 2013, and one exchange showed Clinton mistakenly responding to senior aide Huma Abedin’s email about drone strikes with questions about furniture.

{mosads}“I like the idea of these,” Clinton wrote in the email.   

“How high are they? What would the bench be made of? And I’d prefer two shelves or attractive boxes/baskets/ conmtainers [sic] on one. What do you think?”

When Abedin emailed back to ask if Clinton had meant to send that to her, the then-secretary of State responded: “No-sorry! Also, pls let me know if you got a reply from my ipad. I’m not sure replies go thru.”

Nick Merrill, a Clinton spokesman, told the AP that she occasionally used her iPad to read news clippings.

Clinton, the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016, told reporters in March that she opted to use her personal email address for official business for the convenience of having to only rely on one device.

“First, when I got to work as secretary of State, I opted for convenience to use my personal email account, which was allowed by the State Department, because I thought it would be easier to carry just one device for my work and for my personal emails instead of two,” she said during a press conference at the United Nations.

“Obviously, it hasn’t worked out that way.”

Clinton has turned over more than 30,000 emails to the State Department, which will release them publicly once national security information is redacted. But she also deleted another batch of 30,000 that she described as strictly personal.

That’s drawn the ire of Republican lawmakers who accuse her of setting up her own email server in order to have the ability to delete potentially damaging emails, hiding them from disclosure.

Adrienne Watson, a spokeswoman for the pro-Clinton rapid response group Correct the Record, blasted the GOP attacks.

“This is an attempt by the right wing to beat to death a manufactured controversy and distract from real issues such as getting good paying jobs to working and middle class Americans,” Watson told The Hill.

“Hillary used her iPad as many do, to read news clippings. Republicans should demand a message from their leaders instead of failed attacks.”

The House Select Committee on Benghazi has requested that Clinton turn over her email server for an independent recovery and analysis, but Clinton told the committee that she deleted all the emails on it.

— Updated at 11:41 a.m.