State Department spokesman John Kirby would not commit Tuesday to the agency finishing, in time for the general election in November, its review of Hillary Clinton's 22 top-secret emails and whether they were classified at the time they were sent or received on her private server.

Associated Press reporter Matt Lee pointed out this might be information voters would be interested in about Clinton, the potential Democratic nominee for president, before November.

"Can you commit to getting the results of this review into the top secret, into the classified … before there is a general election in this country?" Lee asked.

Kirby bristled at the idea of elections driving when the review would be completed.

"I’m not going to commit to a specific timeline," Kirby said. "The secretary [John Kerry] wants this review to be done thoroughly and accurately and efficiently, and he’s not going to allow himself, or the process, or the department to be driven by the political calendar on this."

Lee responded a judge had set deadlines of his own for review of Clinton's emails, not all of which had been met by the State Department.

"The fact of the matter is that today in fact is one of those deadlines in the electoral and political process, and the judge in the FOIA case set deadlines, some of which you made, some of which you didn’t," Lee said.

"Look, it's one thing to meet a deadline for the distribution of these documents, which as you pointed out, sometimes we made it. Sometimes we didn’t, and the judge was–the judge–" Kirby said.

"Was not happy," Lee finished.

"Mandated a subsequent deadline process here for us," Kirby said. "But in the case of investigations and reviews, it is not always the case that reviews and investigations are given deadlines to be complete. Specifically, because you want investigators to have the leeway to look at things as deeply and as thoroughly as they need to."

Full exchange: