Top Clinton Aides Abedin and Sullivan Sent Classified Info on Personal Email Accounts, Too

When former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was busted last year for using multiple private email accounts and a private home-brew server to conduct all of her official government business, she claimed all email was reviewed and that emails containing personal information were deleted upon her departure from the position. The rest, she reassured, was turned over to the Department as required. 

Now that we know Clinton hosted thousands of pages of top secret, classified information on her server, including extremely sensitive human source information, the looming question has become whether the aides she assigned to go through her email, not to mention those who received classified information through email, had the required security clearance to do so. Considering the Inspector General reviewing the case had to obtain special clearance to handle a number of Clinton's emails because of the high level of sensitive material contained within them, the answer to that question is likely no. 

Today, Judicial Watch is out with a report showing not only did top Clinton aides Huma Abedine and Jake Sullivan also use unsecured, personal email accounts to communication with Clinton during her time at the State Department, but they received classified information from her on those accounts.

Judicial Watch today released nearly 70 pages of State Department records that show that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her top aides, Deputy Chiefs of Staff Huma Abedin and Jake Sullivan, received and sent classified information on their non-state.gov email accounts.  The documents, also available on the State Department website, were obtained in response to a court order from a May 5, 2015, lawsuit filed against the State Department (Judicial Watch, Inc. v. U.S. Department of State (No. 1:15-cv-00684)) after it failed to respond to a March 18 Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

The new documents show that Hillary Clinton used the clintonemail.com system to ask Huma Abedin (also on a non-state.gov email account) to print two March 2011 emails, which were sent from former British Prime Minister Tony Blair (using the moniker “aclb”) to Jake Sullivan on Sullivan’s non-state.gov email account.  The Obama State Department redacted the Blair emails under Exemption (b)(1) which allows the withholding of classified material.  The material is marked as being classified as “Foreign government information” and “foreign relations or foreign activities of the US, including confidential sources.”

The newly released Abedin emails include a lengthy exchange giving precise details of Clinton’s schedule using unsecured government emails. The email from Lona J. Valmoro, former Special Assistant to Secretary of State Clinton, to Abedin and Clinton reveals exact times (including driving times) and locations of all appointments throughout the day. Another itinerary email provides details about a meeting at the United Nations in New York at 3:00 on Tuesday, January 31, 2012, with the precise disclosure, “that would mean wheels up from Andrews at approximately 12:00pm/12:15pm.”

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“These emails show that Hillary Clinton isn’t the only Obama official who should be worried about being prosecuted for mishandling classified information.  Her former top State aides (and current campaign advisers) Huma Abedin and Jake Sullivan should be in the dock, as well,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said about the findings in a statement.  “The Obama State Department has now confirmed that Clinton, Abedin, and Sullivan used unsecured, non-government email accounts to communicate information that should now be withheld from the American people ‘in the interest of national defense or foreign policy, and properly classified.’ When can we expect the indictments?”