The Obama administration admitted for the first time Friday that the former secretary of state's private email server contained "top secret" messages.
The existence of the classified messages on 22 emails has prompted the State Department to withhold releasing 37 pages of documents deemed too sensitive for public view.
State Department spokesman John Kirby emphasized that the documents were not marked classified at the time they were sent.
Nonetheless, the revelation — just three days before the Iowa caucuses — is likely to force Clinton to face a fresh round of scrutiny on an issue that has dogged her presidential campaign for months.
A Clinton campaign spokesman released a sharply worded statement that downplayed the news and called for the release of the emails.
"This appears to be overclassification run amok," said spokesman Brian Fallon.
BRIAN SNYDER/REUTERS U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton pauses while speaking during a campaign stop at Grand View University in Des Moines, Iowa.
"After a process that has been dominated by bureaucratic infighting that has too often played out in public view, the loudest and leakiest participants in this interagency dispute have now prevailed in blocking any release of these emails," Fallon added.
"This flies in the face of the fact that these emails were unmarked at the time they were sent, and have been called 'innocuous' by certain intelligence officials."
Kirby said the State Department "upgraded" the classification of the messages at the request of U.S. intelligence agencies "because they contain a category of top secret information."
It remains unclear whether those emails were written by Clinton or written by other officials and forwarded by her aides.
The State Department also revealed for the first time that emails between President Obama and Clinton are being withheld "to protect the president's ability to receive unvarnished advice and counsel." None of the eight email chains, totaling 18 messages, will be released as part of the latest batch.
The controversy has remained a thorn in Clinton's side since last March. After repeated attempts to brush it aside, Clinton eventually apologized for using her private email to conduct government business.
She has long insisted that none of the emails routed through a server installed in her Westchester home were marked classified when they were sent or received.
It's unclear what penalty Clinton could face if she's found to have incorrectly classified the emails. Possible sanctions for such violations can range from a warning to potential criminal charges.
But Clinton's team has argued she didn't break any rules because she had used her State Department colleagues' official government addresses — and therefore copies of those emails were retained by the State Department
An FBI investigation of how classified information ended up on Clinton's server is ongoing — but experts said it's highly unlikely that Clinton will be charged with wrongdoing because of the lack of evidence showing that she intended to break any laws.
The State Department has been working to release all 33,000 emails from the private server to comply with a court order. An additional 1,000 emails were expected to be made available Friday night. The email dump was triggered by a lawsuit filed by a reporter for Vice News.
Officials had initially set Friday as the deadline for the release of all the emails — but the State Department has asked for an extension due to internal oversight and last week's blizzard that slammed parts of the East Coast.
The new deadline — set now for Feb. 29 — is after the first four primary states have voted, leading critics to question whether Clinton was being protected as she makes a White House run.
The White House has denied those allegations - but that didn't stop Republicans from attacking Clinton.
In a tweet Friday night, GOP front-runner Donald Trump wrote: "The new e-mail release is a disaster for Hillary Clinton. At a minimum, how can someone with such bad judgement be our next president?"
In an interview published Friday, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), said he believes the FBI already has enough evidence to indict Clinton and her top aide Huma Abedin, who is married to disgraced for Queens Rep. Anthony Weiner.
"I think the FBI director would like to indict both Huma and Hillary as we speak," Issa told The Washington Examiner.
References
- ^ hillary clinton (www.nydailynews.com)
- ^ iowa caucuses (www.nydailynews.com)
- ^ hillary clinton emails (www.nydailynews.com)
- ^ 2016 election (www.nydailynews.com)
- ^ bernie sanders (www.nydailynews.com)
- ^ new hampshire primaries (www.nydailynews.com)
- ^ congress (www.nydailynews.com)
- ^ fbi (www.nydailynews.com)
- ^ north korea (www.nydailynews.com)
