Judicial Watch Sues for Records of Clinton State Department Protocol Officer

State Department Official Went to Fundraise for Clinton Foundation, Clinton Campaign

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today that it sued the U.S. Department of State for emails, calendar entries and other information in the electronic file of Dennis Cheng, who was Deputy Chief of Protocol for two years under former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (Judicial Watch v U.S. Department of State (No. 1:18-cv-00221)).

Cheng was deputy chief of protocol of the United States from July 2009-July 2011. Following his tenure at the State Department, Cheng joined the Clinton Family Foundation as director of development, and then in April 2015 became finance director of the Hillary for America presidential campaign.

Prior to joining the Clinton State Department, Cheng was finance director in New York for Mrs. Clinton’s successful campaign for Senate.

Judicial Watch filed the complaint after the State Department failed to respond to a December 21, 2017, Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for:

[T]he PST file of Dennis Cheng. Mr. Cheng served as Deputy Chief of Protocol of the United States from July 20, 2009 to July 2011. A PST file is a Personal Storage Table, an open proprietary file format used to store copies of messages, calendar events, and other items within Microsoft software such as Microsoft Exchange Client, Windows Messaging, and Microsoft Outlook.

While at the Clinton Foundation, Cheng raised $246 million in just over three-and-a-half years, July 2011-February 2015. A separate FOIA lawsuit by Citizens United found that Cheng communicated with Huma Abedin about a major Clinton Foundation dinner and other issues.

Previous Judicial Watch FOIA litigation uncovered the Clinton email scandal and ethics scandal, Bill Clinton’s conflicts of interest issues, and the pay-to-play scandal involving the Clinton State Department and donors to the Clinton Foundation and Clinton campaigns.

“Judicial Watch proved the Clinton State Department became a corrupt arm of the Clinton Foundation,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “The Justice and State Departments seem to be still protecting Hillary Clinton. Judicial Watch is stepping into the gap and, though this and other ongoing FOIA lawsuits, aims to expose and hold the Clinton cash machine accountable to the rule of law.”

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