Clinton, now the Democratic nominee for President, was the subject of a substantial investigation over the emails, though ultimately the Obama Administration decided not to charge her with any crimes related to the violations.
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Clinton told investigators that she was unaware that her aide had deleted the e-mails in 2015. That particular email had been marked as classified at the confidential level, the lowest level of classification.
Clinton said she was unfamiliar with the meaning of the letter “c” next to a paragraph and speculated that it might be “referencing paragraphs marked in alphabetical order”. Clinton has told the Bureau that it was only for convenience and never to evade public record laws that she used her own e-mail.
Either way, Clinton said she regarded the content of the email as a “condolence call” and questioned the classification level.
“Clinton’s reckless conduct and dishonest attempts to avoid accountability show she can not be trusted with the presidency and its chief obligation as commander-in-chief of the USA armed forces”, wrote Donald Trump campaign communications staffer Jason Miller in response to the FBI’s release of more documents from its investigation.
According to the summary of her interview, Clinton said she did not know exactly what Powell was saying in that email and that his message “did not factor into her decision to use a personal email account”.
Meanwhile, the State Department has been ordered to review for possible release almost 15,000 additional emails and documents uncovered during the FBI investigation that had not been disclosed by her lawyers.
There was indication that unknown parties attempted to access her email server and one case where an email account belonging to a Bill Clinton staffer may have already been successfully “undermined”. More recently, two conservative groups, Citizens United and Judicial Watch, have received separate batches of State Department e-mails from their litigation, which has showed a connection between work at the Clinton Foundation and the Clinton State Department.
The several-dozen pages released Friday also show Clinton repeatedly claimed to have little training or understanding about the classification process – despite leading the department that handled such information on a regular basis and having a security clearance.
The FBI could find no evidence that any of those classified documents had been compromised, but also cautioned that it might lack the forensic records to know if they had been.
Clinton avoided the worst potential outcome of the investigation when the FBI closed the probe in July and recommended she not be prosecuted.
In its summary of the investigation, the FBI said Clinton had emailed Powell a day after she was sworn in to office about Powell’s use of a personal email account when he was the country’s top diplomat.
In its summary of the interview with Clinton, the agency said she had received no instructions or directions on preserving or producing State Department records while transitioning out of her post. And she did little to keep her account a secret. She said she had no intention of removing classification markings, and that she couldn’t recall actually receiving a “nonpaper” or secure fax.
Clinton told the Federal Bureau of Investigation that she directed her aides in early 2009 to create a private email account and that, “as a matter of convenience”, it was moved onto a system maintained by her husband’s staff.
Clinton told agents there were never so many suspicious emails to cause concerns. The release provided another vivid example of how the email scandal will likely continue to dog the Clinton campaign until Election Day and beyond.
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However, there has been no evidence that the hacking were successful.
