Clinton asks staff to turn over email server, thumb drive

Hillary Clinton has asked her staff to hand over her homemade email server to the Justice Department, her campaign said Tuesday night — just hours after an independent government watchdog said she had at least two “top secret” emails on her unsecured network.

Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill told reporters that Clinton “directed her team to give her email server that was used during her tenure as secretary to the Department of Justice, as well as a thumb drive containing copies of her emails already provided to the State Department.”


“She pledged to cooperate with the government’s security inquiry, and if there are more questions, we will continue to address them,” he added.

The FBI opened a probe of the security of Clinton’s private email setup after an intelligence community inspector general found four classified messages while inspecting a small pool of just 40 of Clinton’s 35,000 emails. Clinton used a personal server rather than a State.gov official address, which goes against transparency rules and has landed her in trouble on the campaign trail.

While her critics have accused her of secrecy, the intelligence community has been worried about whether classified information was at risk or could have been compromised.

The watchdog referred the matter to the FBI, which is now reaching out to a Denver-based technology company that oversaw the technology.

Republicans cheered the campaign’s announcement.

“It’s about time,” said Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), who has asked Clinton to hand over her server before to the State inspector general. “Secretary Clinton’s previous statements that she possessed no classified information were patently untrue. Her mishandling of classified information must be fully investigated.”

But they also said it’s not the end of their questions. Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said he still wants to know how classified information ended up on thumbdrive in an office building downtown in the first place.

“It’s a welcome development, but it’s hard to believe that the Clinton private server and the thumb drives in the possession of Ms. Clinton’s personal lawyer have just recently been turned over to the authorities. That’s a long time for top secret classified information to be held by an unauthorized person outside of an approved, secure government facility,” he said. “I look forward to the FBI answering my questions … and hold accountable anyone who broke the rules.”

Clinton’s Tuesday night announcement came hours after the same intelligence community inspector general confirmed that two of 40 emails it examined had “top secret” information, according to a letter the office sent Grassley.

“These emails … have been properly marked by IC classification officials, and include information classified up to ‘TOP SECRET,’” reads the letter to the Iowa Republican.

They had previously been described to lawmakers as “above Secret,” requiring a lower clearance level, Grassley’s staff says. Top secret classifications are among the highest and most sensitive.

The ICIG said two additional emails it found were also classified by the State Department at the time they were sent, but it’s awaiting notification from State on the exact level of classification.

State spokesperson John Kirby confirmed in an email, “The Intelligence Community has recommended that portions of two of the four emails identified by the Intelligence Community’s Inspector General should be upgraded to the Top Secret level.”

“Department employees circulated these emails on unclassified systems in 2009 and 2011 and ultimately some were forwarded to Secretary Clinton,” the statement continued, but added this important caveat. “They were not marked as classified.”

Republicans pounced.

“This information revealed by the inspector general makes it even more important that the FBI and the State Department secure these documents,” Grassley said in a statement when releasing the letter. “To date, the two agencies most critical to securing this information have failed to assure the American people that they are taking the necessary steps to protect America’s national security interests.”

On Capitol Hill, congressional Republicans are starting to push harder on State, the FBI and Justice Department as well as on Clinton and her staff, to answer questions about their email practices. Grassley, for example, wants the State Department to give all of Clinton’s emails over to the intelligence community inspector general to see how many emails in total contained sensitive information. State has resisted such calls, saying the jurisdiction lies with its own inspector general at the State Department.

Lawmakers have also been asking questions about the backup of Clinton’s emails that her lawyer David Kendall had been keeping in his office on a thumb drive. That thumb drive likely had copies of the classified correspondence, the inspector general has said.

A State inspector general spokesman on Tuesday, meanwhile, confirmed that it also is looking at Clinton’s top aides and how they used email.

“Our review is not just focused on Secretary Clinton,” the Tuesday statement said. “We will follow the facts wherever they lead, to include former aides and associates, as appropriate.”

It would not say which aides.