Inspector’s audit: Clinton email use broke federal rule

Associated Press

WASHINGTON

Hillary Clinton and her team ignored clear guidance from the State Department that her email setup broke federal standards and could leave sensitive material vulnerable to hackers, a department audit has found. Her aides twice brushed aside concerns, in one case telling technical staff “the matter was not to be discussed further.”

The inspector general’s review Wednesday also revealed that hacking attempts forced then-Secretary of State Clinton off email at one point in 2011, though she insists the personal server she used never was breached. Clinton and several of her senior staff declined to be interviewed for the investigation.

Earlier this month, Clinton declared that she was happy to “talk to anybody, anytime” about the matter and would encourage her staff to do the same.

Opponents of her Democratic presidential campaign pointed to the audit as proof that Clinton has not been truthful about her private email use as fresh evidence she is not trustworthy or qualified to be commander in chief.

Campaigning in California, presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump noted solemnly that Clinton had received “a little bad news” and then railed against her “horribly bad judgment.”

Clinton, also campaigning in California, didn’t mention the controversy and ignored reporters’ shouted questions. A spokesman for Clinton, who served as the nation’s top diplomat from 2009 to 2013, declared the audit showed her email use was consistent with what others at the department have done.

The 78-page analysis, a copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press, says Clinton ignored clear directives. She never sought approval to conduct government business over private email, and never demonstrated the server or the Blackberry she used while in office “met minimum information security requirements.”

The review encompassed the email and information practices of the past five secretaries of state, finding them “slow to recognize and to manage effectively the legal requirements and cybersecurity risks associated with electronic data communications, particularly as those risks pertain to its most senior leadership.”

The audit did note that former Secretary of State Colin Powell had also exclusively used a private email account, though it did not name any other prior secretaries who had done so. But the failings of Clinton were singled out in the audit as being more serious than her predecessor.