Spokesman John Kirby toured the morning circuit to reinforce State’s position. | AP Photo State Dept. spokesman hits morning shows to deny Clinton email quid pro quo

The State Department on Tuesday vigorously dismissed reports that a quid pro quo was offered to the FBI in exchange for downgrading a classification of one of Hillary Clinton’s emails from her private server when she was secretary of state.

State immediately sought to refute the claim from an official inside the FBI’s records management division who accused Patrick Kennedy, undersecretary of state for management, of pushing to have a classified email downgraded to unclassified last year. In exchange, the official told the FBI that State would allow the FBI to place agents in more countries, though it remains unclear exactly who sought the "quid pro quo."


Mark Toner, a deputy spokesperson at the State Department, denied the allegations Monday in a statement and again during the department’s daily briefing. Despite that, though, State trotted out spokesman John Kirby to put cold water on the coal of claims.

Kirby toured the morning circuit to reinforce State’s position, flatly denying on Fox News, CNN and MSNBC that any quid pro quo had occurred or was even recommended. Kirby downplayed the FBI notes of a possible quid pro quo as the summary of a single interview with a sole FBI employee — not facts, not conclusions, not investigation results, but notes.

“We looked into this. The FBI looked into this, and it’s is just not true,” Kirby told “Fox and Friends.” “There was no quid pro quo even suggested or any kind of bargain laid on the table.”

In his series of interviews, Kirby maintained that what did happen is Kennedy called the FBI “to get a little bit better understanding about why they wanted one particular email classified secret.”

State, he noted on CNN, felt the email didn’t need to be classified, but the FBI disagreed. “The FBI held firm to their position, and the email remained classified. And that, you know, that email redacted is on our website,” he said, suggesting people go there to view it themselves. “But there was no bargain sought by the FBI. There was no bargain rendered. This was simply an interagency conversation about the classification over one particular email. So there was no wrongdoing here.”

Kirby explained that a conversation about additional slots for FBI agents in Iraq did occur — but separately. “That conversation did happen,” he said. “Both those conversations happened. But to try to link them together and say that there was some sort of bargain sought is just not accurate.”

The unnamed official’s claim was revealed amid a 100 pages of notes the bureau released Monday from its closed investigation into Clinton’s server.

“[Redacted] received a call from [Redacted] of the International Operations Division (IOD) of the FBI, who ‘pressured’ him to change the classified email to unclassified,” the FBI wrote from its interview. “[Redacted] indicated he had been contacted by PATRICK KENNEDY, Undersecretary of State, who had asked his assistance in altering the email’s classification in exchange for a ‘quid pro quo.’”