State Dept. FINDS hitlery VIOLATED law on e-mails

Apollonian

Apollonian

Guest Columnist
Here are the most critical parts of the State Department inspector general report on Clinton’s email use​
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Link: http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/he...-on-clinton’s-email-use/ar-BBttEYG?li=BBnb7Kz

The Washington Post
Carol Morello, Jia Lynn Yang

Then-US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, second from right, checks her Blackberry phone alongside Korean Foreign Minister Kim Sung-hwan, right, as she attends the Fourth High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in Busan, Korea, November 30, 2011.

State Dept. audit faults Clinton in emails

In this Oct. 18, 2011, file photo, then-Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton checks her Blackberry from a desk inside a C-17 military plane upon her departure from Malta.© AP Photo/Kevin Lamarque, Pool, File In this Oct. 18, 2011, file photo, then-Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton checks her Blackberry from a desk inside a C-17 military plane upon her departure from…

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.

2. In June 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.

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.”

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.
 
Hillary Responds To Damaging State Department Report​

Link: http://www.govtslaves.info/hillary-responds-to-damaging-state-department-report/

(Zero Hedge) Following the release of the damning report by the State Department Inspector General, which as we noted earlier, found not only that Hillary’s error to surrender all emails violated government policy, but that her 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, everyone was waiting for the official response from Hillary’s camp. It came out moments ago from Reuters.

CLINTON SPOKESMAN SAYS INSPECTOR GENERAL’S REPORT SHOWS CLINTON’S EMAIL PRACTICES CONSISTENT WITH THAT OF FORMER SECRETARIES OF STATE

In other words, while Hillary’s gross lack of judgment was not “Bush’s fault”, she merely did the same errors as all other previous StateSecs did – in her opinion – and as a result you must acquit.

While we await further commentary from Clinton, we can only assume that Hillary’s sole justification for why she did what even the OIG now says was a violation of federal record policies, will not be “because others did it.”

Furthermore, as the Hill adds, we wonder if “other” Secretaries of State had the following exchange with their top advisors:

In November 2010, longtime aide Huma Abedin suggested that Clinton consider a state.gov email account or “releasing” her personal clintonemail.com address to the State Department.

Clinton might want to consider the move, Abedin suggested, “so you are not going to spam.”

But Clinton appeared to reject the proposal from her then-deputy chief of staff for operations.

“Let’s get separate address or device but I don’t want any risk of the personal being accessible,” she said.

The problem for Hillary, as a Romanian hacker is about to testify under oath and who previously said that he had gained access to the former Hillary’s “completely unsecured” server – “It was like an open orchid on the Internet”, “there were hundreds of folders” – both appear to have been very easily accessible.
 
Clinton Tech Says Hillary’s Private Email System Was ‘Attacked’ Forcing Server Shutdown​

by Rachel Stockman | 3:29 pm, May 25th, 2016

Link: http://lawnewz.com/high-profile/cli...e-email-server-was-attacked-forcing-shutdown/

Hillary Clinton via shutterstockWednesday morning a scathing audit of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton‘s email usage (along with the email use of Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, and others) was released. Investigators with the State Department Inspector General’s Office found that Clinton likely violated federal record keeping rules when she maintained the private server at her New York home. However, buried in the 83-page audit report may be an even more significant new piece of information. A tech advisor servicing the Clinton private email system reportedly notified Clinton’s staff that someone was trying and then had possibly “attacked” her server. In the report, Clinton also complained about receiving suspicious emails. Auditors found that when that happened, she may also violated procedure by not notifying the proper security personnel about the emails. The OIG’s report seems to contradict what presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton told NBC’s Andrea Mitchell in a recent interview about whether there was any “indication she had been hacked.”

Here is the section from page 41 of the report which references an “attack”:


On January 9, 2011, the non-Departmental advisor to President Clinton who provided technical support to the Clinton email system notified the Secretary’s Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations that he had to shut down the server because he believed “someone was trying to hack us and while they did not get in i didnt [sic] want to let them have the chance to.” Later that day, the advisor again wrote to the Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations, “We were attacked again so I shut [the server] down for a few min.” On January 10, the Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations emailed the Chief of Staff and the Deputy Chief of Staff for Planning and instructed them not to email the Secretary “anything sensitive” and stated that she could “explain more in person.”

Earlier this month, NBC’s Mitchell asked Clinton the following, “Any indication your private server was hacked by foreign hackers?” “No,” Clinton replied. “Not at all.”

However, the audit reveals that Clinton did have suspicions that someone had breached her email back in 2011. See footnote 159 from the audit:


In another incident occurring on May 13, 2011, two of Secretary Clinton’s immediate staff discussed via email the Secretary’s concern that someone was “hacking into her email” after she received an email with a suspicious link. Several hours later, Secretary Clinton received an email from the personal account of then-Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs that also had a link to a suspect website. The next morning, Secretary Clinton replied to the email with the following message to the Under Secretary: “Is this really from you? I was worried about opening it!” Department policy requires employees to report cybersecurity incidents to IRM security officials when any improper cyber-security practice comes to their attention. 12 FAM 592.4 (January 10, 2007). Notification is required when a user suspects compromise of, among other things, a personally owned device containing personally identifiable information. 12 FAM 682.2-6 (August 4, 2008). However, OIG found no evidence that the Secretary or her staff reported these incidents to computer security personnel or anyone else within the Department.

In a statement, Clinton’s campaign spokesperson emphasized that Clinton’s use of a private email was not unique (Secretary of State Powell also used private email), but he didn’t respond to any of the hacking allegations.
 
Judicial Watch Statement on State Department OIG Report on Hillary Clinton’s Email Practices​

MAY 25, 2016

Link: http://www.judicialwatch.org/press-...-oig-report-hillary-clintons-email-practices/

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton made the following statement regarding the recently released report by the State Department’s Office of the Inspector General regarding former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s email practices:

It was Judicial Watch’s litigation that almost certainly forced the State Department to publicly disclose Hillary Clinton’s secret email account that is now the subject of a scathing Inspector General Report. A statement by the State Department in a February 2, 2015, status report in response to a Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit was the first notice to the public and the court that State had failed to thoroughly search all of Clinton’s email records: “[The State Department] has discovered that additional searches for documents potentially responsive to the FOIA must be conducted.” That statement was the first acknowledgement of Clinton’s secret email. And now, nearly a year and a half later, the State Department’s own Inspector General is confirming the gravity of Clinton’s end run around the law. Judicial Watch already uncovered much of the information cited in this report. But the OIG report will be helpful in upcoming questioning of witnesses about the Clinton email matter.

Read more about hillary clinton email, Hillary Clinton email scandal
 
Charlie Rose Blasts Queenzilla In 'Blistering' Email Report ​


CBS NEWS AND NANCY CORDES GO HARD AT HILLARY

Link: http://dailybail.com/home/charlie-rose-blasts-queenzilla-in-blistering-email-report.html

I've now watched the Hillary IG story coverage on the big 3 national news broadcasts from last night, and CBS was by far the most negative toward Clinton, where ABC News and Ken doll David Muir went the easiest on Queen Hillzilla, practically copy/pasting their script straight from Clinton campaign talking points. It's interesting because Nancy Cordes wrote and reported the CBS piece and she is pretty tight with Bernie, including sitting at his table and getting drunk with him at the White House Correspondents Dinner last month.
 
Ex-NSA Chief Michael Hayden: 'Every Foreign Intelligence Service In The World Was Thumbing Through Hillary's Email Server'​


HILLARY WENT TO A VERY DARK PLACE WITH HER SERVER

Link: http://dailybail.com/home/ex-nsa-chief-michael-hayden-every-foreign-intelligence-servi.html

At the Tech Crunch conference on May 12, former NSA Director Michael Hayden discussed the Clinton email controversy calling it a catastrophe for national security.

'I would lose respect for scores of foreign intelligence services around the world if they were not already thumbing through every email that was kept on Hillary's server.'
 
Liar, liar! Clinton KNEW email was hacked​

May 26, 2016 |105 Comments

Link: https://thehornnews.com/clinton-hid-email-server-hacks/


The State Department’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) delivered a sharp rebuke to Hillary Clinton yesterday, in a report that heavily criticized her use of a private email server while secretary of state.

But the report included more than evidence of Clinton’s bad judgment.

It proved she has been lying about her emails for months.

Despite repeated denials from Clinton that her emails were compromised, the OIG report concluded that she likely knew her server was hacked — and went to lengths to keep from reporting it.

Already, Clinton faces questions about her trustworthiness, with months of polling showing voters give her low marks for integrity.

According to The Washington Times, “Inspector General Steve Linick, appointed by President Obama, said he couldn’t find any evidence that Mrs. Clinton received approval for her odd email arrangement, and when lower-level staffers pressed the issue, saying she was skirting open-records laws, they were ordered ‘never to speak of the secretary’s personal email system again.’”

What’s more, she may have broken the law by failing to report hacking attempts.

She and her staff suspected they’d been compromised numerous times — and failed to report it. In the past, Clinton has insisted that her home-brew email server was never hacked, but the OIG has determined that to be a untrue.

According to The Washington Times, “In one instance in 2011, Mrs. Clinton’s tech guru thought the server was being hacked and shut it down for a few minutes. Months later, Mrs. Clinton feared yet another hack attack was underway — yet never reported the incident to the department, in another breach of department rules.”

“Notification is required when a user suspects compromise of, among other things, a personally owned device containing personally identifiable information,” OIG released yesterday. “However, OIG found no evidence that the Secretary or her staff reported these incidents to computer security personnel or anyone else within the Department.”

There’s one way to describe that behavior – illegal.

Simple as that.

“This report underscores what we already know about Hillary Clinton: she simply cannot be trusted,” said House Majority Leader Paul Ryan, in a statement.

What worries Democrats more is what may be coming. The FBI investigation into whether Clinton’s use of a private server caused her to mishandle classified information is still ongoing. Officials recently interviewed Clinton’s top aides, including former chief of staff Cheryl Mills and deputy chief of staff Huma Abedin.

A federal indictment would be potentially fatal to her campaign.
 
Government Report on Clinton Email Scandal Much Worse Than Expected​

Link: http://www.commondreams.org/news/20...ort-clinton-email-scandal-much-worse-expected

Report could spell trouble for former secretary of state in final stretch of election as favorability ratings drop

by Nadia Prupis, staff writer


Hillary Clinton and her top aides failed to comply with U.S. State Department policies on records by using her personal email server and account, possibly jeopardizing official secrets, an internal watchdog concluded in a long-awaited report (pdf) on Wednesday.

Clinton also never sought permission from the department's legal staff to use the server, which was located at her New York residence, a request which—if filed—"would not" have been approved, the report by the agency's Office of the Inspector General (OIG) states.

"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," it continues.

The findings are the latest development in the email scandal that has persisted throughout Clinton's presidential campaign to little effect—but its conclusion was unexpectedly critical.

And it could spell trouble for the former secretary of state in the final stretch of the election, as public trust in Clinton continues to decline while polls show her rival Bernie Sanders has become the most formidable candidate against Republican presumptive nominee Donald Trump.

As Politico's Rachael Bade, Josh Gerstein, and Nick Gass write:


The watchdog’s findings could exact further damage to Clinton’s campaign, and they provide fresh fodder for Trump, who has already said he will go after Clinton for the email scandal “bigly.” The Democratic frontrunner’s bid for the White House has already been hindered by high unfavorability ratings, with people saying they don’t trust her.

The report represents the latest pushback — in this case by a nonpartisan government entity — against her campaign’s claim that she did not break any rules and that her use of a private server was completely allowed.

In fact, technology staff in the Information Resource Management (S/ES-IRM) office who brought up concerns about Clinton's use of her private server were reportedly instructed not to question the arrangement.

"In one meeting, one staff member raised concerns that information sent and received on Secretary Clinton’s account could contain Federal records that needed to be preserved in order to satisfy Federal recordkeeping requirements," the report states. "According to the staff member, the Director [of S/ES-IRM] stated that the Secretary's personal system had been reviewed and approved by Department legal staff and that the matter was not to be discussed any further. As previously noted, OIG found no evidence that staff in the Office of the Legal Adviser reviewed or approved Secretary Clinton's personal system."

Other staff from different offices were also instructed "never to speak of the Secretary's personal email system again."

On Wednesday, Clinton's campaign was quick to point out that the report's criticisms also extended to the State Department in general, which the OIG found to be riddled with "longstanding, systemic weaknesses related to electronic records and communications" and noted that other department officials, including former Secretary of State Colin Powell, also used personal e-mails while in office.

The findings were issued a day after a group of U.S. intelligence veterans, including William Binney, John Kiriakou, and Diane Roark, published an open letter to President Barack Obama urging him to expedite the forthcoming FBI report on Clinton’s alleged email security violations.

"The question is not whether Secretary Clinton broke the law," the letter states. "She did. If the laws are to be equally applied, she should face the same kind of consequences as others who have been found, often on the basis of much less convincing evidence, guilty of similar behavior."
 
Hillary Clinton's shrinking email defense​

Link: http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/26/opinions/clinton-email-server-ig-report-opinion-cox/

By Douglas Cox
Updated 9:49 AM ET, Thu May 26, 2016


(CNN) — While an FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton's email server continues, the State Department's Office of Inspector General has raised the stakes with the release of a remarkable report finding that Clinton's actions violated State Department policies and were inconsistent with federal record-keeping laws.

The report also discloses new details relevant to Clinton's motives and her assertion that the use of a private server was simply a matter of convenience. While criminal charges still remain highly unlikely, the inspector general's report is significant and unquestionably damaging to Clinton's public defense.

Most crucially, the inspector general directly contradicts Clinton's repeated assertions that she complied both with federal law and State Department policies. "At a minimum," the report finds, "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 Department's policies that were implemented in accordance with the Federal Records Act."

The report goes further, noting that while Clinton's subsequent production of 55,000 pages of emails in response to State Department demands partially corrected these violations, the records Clinton turned over were incomplete. Remarkably, the report includes reference to a previously unreleased 2010 email in which Clinton, responding to her deputy chief of staff for operations, Huma Abedin, directly addresses her lack of an official State Department email account and voices a fear of the "risk of the personal being accessible" if she had one. In a briefing, State Department officials were unable to confirm the source of this email, but if it was omitted from the records Clinton produced, it again would raise questions about the process she used to distinguish between "federal records" and "personal records" before destroying the latter.

The inspector general also reveals the comments of State Department records management staff in late 2010 expressly raising concerns that Clinton's private email server "could contain federal records that needed to be preserved in order to satisfy federal record-keeping requirements." A senior official rebuffed these concerns, claiming that Clinton's email arrangement "had been approved by the department legal staff" -- an assertion the inspector general concluded was untrue -- and directed staff "never to speak of the secretary's personal email system again."

Such facts undermine the argument that the significance of maintaining a private server and the negative effects it could have, including on responses to Freedom of Information Act requests or congressional subpoenas, were simply overlooked.

Clinton's response

Clinton's response to the report is further complicated by the fact that the State Department did not contest the inspector general's findings, concurred with its recommendations, and even acknowledges in its response that "the department could have done better at preserving emails." All of this would serve to undermine assertions by Clinton that the inspector general's conclusions are biased or politically motivated.

Indeed, thus far Clinton's response has focused on the argument that other secretaries of state also used private email. "Well there may be reports that come out," Clinton commented, "but nothing has changed. It's the same story. Just like previous secretaries of state I used a personal email, many people did. It was not at all unprecedented." And, it is true that the inspector general does not spare former Secretary Colin Powell from similar allegations, documenting his use of private email and his admitted failure to preserve those emails.

Yet this arguably only furthers the perception that the inspector general's review was both balanced and non-biased. And Clinton's response highlights how her defense -- which began with confident assertions that she followed all the rules and broke no laws -- has now been reduced to the argument that "others did it too" or that the rules she violated were not significant.

Criminal charges?

Despite the inspector general's report, criminal charges against Clinton remain highly unlikely. While the report provides previously nonpublic information relevant to Clinton's motivations, the available public evidence remains insufficient to illustrate two facts needed for a criminal charge -- that she knew that emails on her private server were classified and that she intentionally mishandled classified information.

Yet the inspector general's report also highlights the uncertainty that surrounds the precise scope of the current FBI investigation. To the extent the FBI has limited its inquiry to security issues and the possible mishandling of classified information, for example, the inspector general's report finding violations of the federal records laws potentially implicates a different criminal statute.

Removing, concealing, or destroying federal records, regardless of whether they are classified, can constitute a federal felony. But again, courts have generally required prosecutors pursuing this charge to prove that defendants knew they were violating the law, for which the evidence against Clinton appears to be lacking.

In the end, extracting the truth in the Clinton email controversy in the current polarized political environment remains a nearly impossible task.

Some have already begun to seize upon the inspector general's report, mischaracterizing it as clear evidence of a crime. And when the Department of Justice announces that it is not filing criminal charges -- as is both expected and perhaps inevitable -- Clinton will likely argue that it constitutes proof that she did nothing wrong.

Based on the publicly available evidence, the reality appears to be nuanced in a way that is satisfying to neither side.

Clinton violated the law, but committed no crime.
 
First Official Report: Hillary Lied About Her Private E-mail Server ​

Written by Bob Adelmann

Link: http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnew...t-hillary-lied-about-her-private-email-server

First Official Report: Hillary Lied About Her Private E-mail Server

In an astonishing display of nonpartisanship, the State Department’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) published its conclusions on Wednesday following its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private e-mail server installed at her home in Chappaqua, New York. In its 83-page report, it concluded that she lied about having gotten approval for use of the server and the personal e-mail account that it served. It further noted that when staff members (while she was secretary of state) questioned her use of it, they were told to shut up, go away, and never to mention it again.

From Page 37: "Secretary Clinton had an obligation to discuss using her personal email account to conduct official business [but she didn’t]."

And according to the OIG report, those staff members responsible for granting such approval “did not — and would not — approve her exclusive reliance on a personal email account to conduct Department business.”

From Page 40:

Two [of her] staff reported … that, in late 2010, they each discussed their concerns about Secretary Clinton’s use of a personal email account in separate meetings with [the information resources director]. In one meeting, one staff member raised concerns that information sent and received on Secretary Clinton’s account could contain Federal records that needed to be preserved in order to satisfy Federal recordkeeping requirements.

According to the staff member, the Director stated that the Secretary’s personal system had been reviewed and approved by Department legal staff and that the matter was not to be discussed any further. As previously noted, OIG found no evidence that [legal] staff reviewed or approved Secretary Clinton’s personal system.

According to the other staff member who raised concerns about the server, the Director stated that the mission of [the IRM] is to support the Secretary and instructed the staff [member] never to speak of the Secretary’s personal email system again.

In fact, it is apparent that Clinton decided on her own to use her own personal e-mail address to conduct State business: “OIG found no evidence that Secretary Clinton ever contacted IRM to request [approval], despite the fact that emails exchanged on her personal account regularly contained information marked as SBU [sensitive but unclassified].”

Reflexively the Clinton campaign attempted to put their own spin on the OIG’s report. First, campaign spokesman Brian Fallon said that “political opponents of Hillary Clinton are sure to misrepresent this report for their partisan purposes,” claiming that the OIG report “documents just how consistent her email practices were with those of other Secretaries [of State] … who also used personal email.” He also claimed “no harm, no foul,” saying, “There is no evidence of any successful breach of the Secretary’s server.”

Politico demolished both of those claims, saying that e-mail technology was not nearly as advanced under previous secretaries and that consequently they were little used. And when they were used, State was aware of it. And just because one instance of an attempted hack failed is certainly no proof that others weren't successful.

In its 83-page report, the OIG noted other issues they uncovered during its now-completed investigation, including reluctance of numerous Clinton staff members to respond to queries by the OIG about their role in Clinton’s decision. Among those who declined to speak were Clinton’s former Chief of Staff Cheryl Mills and her top deputies Jake Sullivan and Huma Abedin. OIG also uncovered evidence that Clinton's personal e-mail account had been hacked at least once, albeit unsuccessfully. In addition OIG learned that a top staff member suggested that she change out her personal account for one approved by State but she refused.

There are three other investigations into the matter pending, including one by the IG of the US Intelligence Community and another by the State Department’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security. The one with the most teeth, the one most likely to bite Hillary Clinton most painfully, is the investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), which is expected to be concluded well before November.

An indictment by the FBI for criminal wrongdoing by the Democrat Party’s likely presidential candidate would confirm that the justice system in the United States isn’t totally corrupt and beyond redemption, but Americans will have to await that outcome.

A graduate of an Ivy League school and a former investment advisor, Bob is a regular contributor to The New American magazine and blogs frequently at LightFromTheRight.com, primarily on economics and politics. He can be reached at badelmann@thenewamerican.com.

Related articles:

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Obama Defends Hillary While Promising No Politics in Investigation

Indictment Could Be Only Weeks Away for Clinton

New E-mails Show Hillary Lied; Risked National Security
 
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