WASHINGTON—Newly disclosed emails show top Obama administration
officials were in close contact with Hillary Clinton's nascent
presidential campaign in early 2015 about the potential fallout
from revelations that the former secretary of state used a private
email server.
Their discussion included a request from the White House
communications director to her counterpart at the State Department
to see if it was possible to arrange for Secretary of State John
Kerry to avoid questions during media appearances about Mrs.
Clinton's email arrangement.
In another instance, a top State Department official assured an
attorney for Mrs. Clinton that, contrary to media reports, a
department official hadn't told Congress that Mrs. Clinton erred in
using a private email account.
The previously unreported emails were obtained by the Republican
National Committee as part of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit
seeking records of Mrs. Clinton's time in office. The RNC provided
to The Wall Street Journal only some of the emails, leaving it
unclear what was in the remaining documents. The RNC said it
released only emails relevant to the communication between the
White House and State Department.
Meredith McGehee, chief of policy, programs, and strategy at the
nonpartisan advocacy group Issue One and an expert on ethics and
campaign finance, said the email exchange would probably raise no
legal concerns because federal law permits members of the White
House staff to engage in some political activity.
Mrs. Clinton's email arrangement has dogged her campaign for
months, with Republicans and other critics saying it shows a
carelessness with government secrets and undermines her claim to
good judgment. Donald Trump's campaign posted a statement on his
website last month saying the Obama White House knew Mrs. Clinton
was using a private email server.
Mrs. Clinton has acknowledged the arrangement was a mistake, but
she has rejected the notion that national secrets were placed at
risk. Her campaign didn't respond to a request for comment about
the new email disclosures.
The emails highlight the revolving door between the State
Department, the White House and the Clinton campaign in early 2015
as Mrs. Clinton geared up to run for president.
The New York Times reported on March 2, 2015, that Mrs. Clinton
had exclusively used a private email server for government business
when she was secretary of state. That set off months of controversy
for Mrs. Clinton's campaign, culminating in a Federal Bureau of
Investigation probe that recommended against prosecution of Mrs.
Clinton.
At the time of the initial report, Mrs. Clinton hadn't formally
declared her intention to mount a presidential campaign, but she
had begun hiring staff ahead of her formal announcement on April
12, 2015.
Ten days after the story broke, White House communications
director Jennifer Palmieri emailed State Department spokeswoman
Jennifer Psaki to ask, "between us on the shows…think we can get
this done so he is not asked about email." That apparently referred
to Mr. Kerry, who appeared in an interview on CBS's "Face the
Nation" three days later.
Ms. Palmieri had previously announced she would be leaving the
administration to join Mrs. Clinton's campaign in mid-2015, but was
still at the White House when she sent the email. Other emails show
Ms. Palmieri helped arrange for Ms. Psaki to move from the State
Department to the White House communications job Ms. Palmieri was
vacating. "Agree completely and working to crush on my end," wrote
back Ms. Psaki, who would move to the White House weeks later.
A day later, Ms. Psaki added, "Good to go on killing CBS idea."
She continued, "And we are going to hold on any other TV options
just given the swirl of crap out there." Mr. Kerry wasn't asked on
CBS about the email server, though it isn't clear how Ms. Psaki
could have guaranteed that.
Teased by Ms. Palmieri about her use of the phrase "swirl of
crap," Ms. Psaki wrote back: "Ha I mean—the challenging stories out
there."
CBS spokeswoman Caitlin Conant said the network had made no
commitments about what questions Mr. Kerry would face. "No subject
was off-limits when this interview was arranged, as is the CBS News
standard," she said. "CBS News' State Department correspondent was
in Egypt with Secretary John Kerry in the home stretch of the Iran
nuclear deal negotiations and discussed policy issues of the day
with him on this official trip."
State Department spokesman John Kirby added that there was
nothing unusual about the Palmieri-Psaki exchange. "It is common
practice for State Department and White House staffers to be in
touch when agency officials are potentially conducting television
interviews," he said.
The RNC also obtained an entirely redacted discussion between
nearly a dozen top White House communications officials with a
subject line referring to Mr. Kerry's appearance on CBS. A White
House official said the internal debate at the time was about
whether Mr. Kerry should appear on the shows at all, rather than
any attempt to influence what questions were asked.
In another email coming from the State Department, Patrick
Kennedy, the undersecretary for management, told Heather Samuelson,
one of Mrs. Clinton's attorneys, about new documents the State
Department had posted concerning the former secretary of state.
Ms. Samuelson was one of the attorneys who reviewed Mrs.
Clinton's emails to determine which were government-related and
which were personal before providing the official ones to the State
Department. She was interviewed by the FBI as part of its probe and
granted limited immunity in exchange for turning over her laptop as
part of the investigation.
In another exchange, Mr. Kennedy told Ms. Samuelson that
Politico was "running [a] story that State official said Secretary
Clinton did wrong thing. Wildly inaccurate reporting."
A Politico spokesman said the organization stood by its
reporting. The story reported that Joyce Barr, assistant secretary
of state for administration, had said in testimony to Congress that
Mrs. Clinton's record-keeping practices were "not acceptable." An
internal watchdog report later concluded that Mrs. Clinton's email
use wasn't permitted under State policy.
Mr. Kirby, the State Department spokesman, said Mr. Kennedy was
"simply offering a reaction to a press article." He added it wasn't
unusual for State officials to be in contact with former
secretaries or their staff.
Write to Byron Tau at byron.tau@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
October 07, 2016 02:05 ET (06:05 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
CBS (NYSE:CBS)
Historical Stock Chart
From Mar 2024 to Apr 2024
CBS (NYSE:CBS)
Historical Stock Chart
From Apr 2023 to Apr 2024