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Getty Citizens United files suit over Hillary Clinton schedules

A conservative group filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit Monday demanding a full set of Hillary Clinton’s schedules as secretary of state.

Citizens United sought the information from the State Department in March of this year. State agreed to “expedite” its handling of the request, but the group says it has yet to receive a response.

“When Citizens United filed this FOIA request back in March 2015, we didn’t anticipate subject matter as straight forward as Secretary Clinton’s schedule would take seven months and counting to produce,” Citizens United President David Bossie said Monday.

“We were encouraged when the State Department granted Citizens United expedited processing for this FOIA based on our status as a media entity. Unfortunately, this did nothing different to move the process forward in a more timely manner,” Bossie said. “The bottom line continues to be, you will likely not receive any public documents from the State Department unless you file a federal lawsuit and that’s what we've done today.”

Hundreds of scheduling-related documents including some of Clinton’s daily schedules have been released through monthly, court-ordered disclosures of messages from the private email account she used for most of her four years as secretary of state.

However, only about 37 percent of pages in Clinton’s private account have been released thus far. Releases are expected to continue through January.

The Citizens United suit (posted here) specifically seeks records prepared by two of Clinton’s schedulers: Lona Valmoro and Linda Dewan. The group’s website also cites a passage in the book, “HRC: State Secrets and the Rebirth of Hillary Clinton,” that says Clinton’s White House meetings to discuss planning for the raid that killed Osama bin Laden were listed on her schedules solely with the vague notation “Meeting.”

The lawsuit comes on the heels of a FOIA suit filed Friday by another conservative group, Judicial Watch, seeking records of training in how to mark classified and other sensitive documents. Judicial Watch’s suit (posted here) asks for records of whether Clinton, former chief of staff Cheryl Mills and former deputy chief of staff Huma Abedin completed such training, as well as information on any employees who had their classification powers suspended due to failure to complete the training.

Justice Department lawyers have said that the State Department is being “crushed” under the burden of FOIA litigation brought on by the disclosure of Clinton’s private email account. At one point, nearly 40 old and new lawsuits involving the Clinton emails were pending.

However, State’s FOIA process often moved at a glacial pace even before the onslaught prompted by the email revelation. Clinton-related requests filed by POLITICO and the Associated Press early in her tenure brought no substantive response for four years.

A State Department spokesman declined to comment for this post, citing a policy of not commenting on pending litigation.

