The latest batch of Hillary Clinton's emails from her time at the State Department includes 84 additional classified documents.
The new emails from her controversial private server, which were retroactively classified since she left office, include 81 which had been upgraded to confidential status and three to secret status. (Classified parts were redacted.)
The Saturday release included 1,012 new pages and 551 additional documents, bringing the total released to 45,830 pages, according to a State Department official. The total means nearly 1,700 emails on Clinton's server have been retroactively classified.
The court-ordered release by the State Department is behind the initial end of January deadline. As a result, more of the Democratic presidential candidate's emails will be released throughout this month, with the final batch coming out on February 29th — the day before Super Tuesday, where 15 states will cast primary or caucus ballots.
Last month, the State Department announced that seven emails chains — 22 documents representing 37 pages — will not be released, because they had been upgraded to top secret, the highest form of classified material.
"We can confirm that later today, as part of our monthly FOIA productions of former Secretary Clinton's emails, the State Department will be denying in full seven email chains, found in 22 documents representing 37 pages," State Department spokesman John Kirby said. "The documents are being upgraded at the request of the intelligence community, because they contain a category of top secret information. These documents were not marked classified at the time they were sent."
Clinton has maintained she never sent material which was classified on the private server at the time. The emails have become a major issue in the presidential race among Republicans, though her Democratic challenger, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, has declined many times to hit her on the emails.
Most of the emails released on Saturday are process related — day-to-day schedules, travel arrangements, memos, notes to staff and the like. Several were from Sidney Blumenthal, the longtime Clinton aide and friend whose frequent emails to the secretary, despite having no official role in the State Department, drew scrutiny from Republicans in her testimony before the House Benghazi Select Committee last fall. In this batch, Blumenthal sent her memos and thoughts on Libya and the scandal surrounding former CIA director and retired Gen. David Petraeus after it was revealed he'd had an affair and shared classified information. In another, he weighed in on whether photographic evidence of the death of Osama bin Laden should be shared with Congress.
In a more comical email, an aide sends Clinton a story shortly before the 2012 elections speculating that "Bill Clinton's ego could cost Obama in November." She writes back: "What can be done?"
Republicans bashed the new emails, emphasizing the newly classified emails should cast doubt on Clinton's trustworthiness and ability to lead the country.
"This court-ordered release is another reminder that Hillary Clinton's attempt to skirt transparency laws put our national security at risk and that she failed to meet her legal obligations to protect classified information as Secretary of State," Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus said in a statement. "With Clinton now tied to three federal investigations by the State Department and FBI, buyer's remorse must be growing amongst the Democrat establishment who have gone out of their way to rig the nominating process in her favor. As the results in Iowa and New Hampshire have shown, even Democrats find Clinton's dishonesty and untrustworthiness unacceptable."
Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.
