Sept. 4, 2016 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
31:31
3401 The Truth About The Hillary Clinton FBI Investigation
"As much as I’ve been investigated and all of that, you know, why would I - I don’t even want - why would I ever want to do e-mail? Can you imagine?“ - Hillary Clinton in 2000In July, FBI Director James B. Comey announced that he would not recommend criminal charges against Hillary Clinton, but noted that she and her staff were “extremely careless” in how they handled classified information. On Friday September 2nd, the FBI released the redacted report regarding the Clinton investigation - including notes on Clinton’s actual testimony. What is the Truth About The Hillary Clinton FBI Investigation? Sourceshttp://www.scribd.com/doc/322860635http://www.scribd.com/doc/322860731http://www.weeklystandard.com/article/2004146/The Truth About Hillary Clinton's Email Controversyhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yl4RQg4Qfg0Freedomain Radio is 100% funded by viewers like you. Please support the show by signing up for a monthly subscription or making a one time donation at: http://www.freedomainradio.com/donate
Hi everybody, Stefan Molyneux from Free Domain Radio.
I hope you're doing well.
So we're going to go on a bit of an interesting journey, a strange journey, but one that is quite fascinating with all of the folds and wrinkles and complexities.
And this is the tale of Hillary Clinton and her wandering emails.
So, interestingly enough, Hillary Clinton said to a fellow named Peter Paul at a fundraiser in 2000, and I quote...
As much as I've been investigated and all of that, you know, why would I, I don't even want, why would I ever want to do email?
Can you imagine?
Well, the time for imagination is past as the FBI has recently released its notes from an interview given to Hillary Clinton, which happened on the July 4th weekend.
That same July, FBI Director James B. Comey announced that he would not recommend criminal charges against Clinton, but that she and her staff were, quote, extremely careless in how they handled classified information.
On Friday, September the 2nd, the FBI released the redacted report regarding the Clinton investigation, including notes on Clinton's actual testimony.
And so they interviewed her July 4th weekend and released the notes just before the Labor Day weekend in September.
I'm not sure I would put that as explicitly nonpartisan, but that's just my thoughts.
So now that there's more information, we're going to go through that.
If you thought it was a train wreck before, boy, you really, really want to hear the full story.
So, Hillary Clinton's creation of the HDR22 at ClintonEmail.com account through her private server coincided with being sworn in as U.S. Secretary of State in mid-January 2009.
Now, the State Department advised that personal email accounts could not be linked to state mobile devices, undoubtedly for security reasons, I would imagine.
As a result, Clinton decided to use a personal device to avoid carrying multiple devices.
At the start of her tenure as Secretary of State, Clinton was offered a state email address, but declined it to instead use her own personal server.
Now, of course, as you probably know, these state email addresses have all of the security and protocols and archiving and access for Freedom of Information Act requests and so on, so she decided to use her own personal server.
This is from the report, FBI report.
On January 23, 2009, Clinton contacted former Secretary of State Colin Powell via email to inquire about his use of a BlackBerry while he was Secretary of State, which was January 2001 to January 2005.
In his email reply, Powell warned Clinton that if it became, quote, public that Clinton had a BlackBerry and she used it to do business, her emails could become, quote, official records and subject to the law.
Powell further advised Clinton, this is from the FBI report, Powell further advised Clinton, quote, be very careful.
I got around it all by not saying much and not using systems that captured the data.
A little oily, in my humble opinion.
FBI report goes on to say, quote, Clinton indicated to the FBI that she understood Powell's comments to mean any work-related communications would be government records, and she stated that That Powell's comments did not factor into her decision to use a personal email account.
Now, do you remember recently in the news Hillary blamed Colin Powell for her decision?
Well, she told the FBI something completely different.
From the report, quote, a May 25, 2016 report issued by the State Office of Inspector General, OIG, states that during Clinton's tenure as Secretary of State, the State Foreign Affairs Manual, FAM, required day-to-day operations at state to be conducted using an authorized information system.
Now, this is one of these phrases, day-to-day operations, I don't know, all operations?
I don't know.
But it seems like a bit hazy.
Quote, while state policy during Clinton's tenure required that day-to-day operations at state be conducted on an authorized information system, there was no restriction on the use of personal email accounts for official business.
So, good job, policy!
Glad you got that clear.
Quote, however, state employees were cautioned about security and records retention concerns regarding the use of personal email.
In 2011, a notice to all state employees was sent on Clinton's behalf, which recommended employees avoid conducting state business from personal email accounts due to information security concerns.
Now, this is interesting because just doing the business is one thing, you know, emailing about meetings and so on, internal, using your personal email is one thing.
There's a whole additional layer of security questions, which I think would go far above and beyond just this recommendation.
Quote, investigation determined that the State Department used the State Messaging and Archive Retrieval Toolset, or SMART, which allows employees to electronically log emails to preserve a record copy.
So, I don't know how that works.
I'm guessing that you go through and say archive, archive, archive.
All right.
Quote, this left the print and file method as the only approved method by which the office of the secretary could preserve record emails.
Now, we'll mention this a little bit later, but when you print an email out, you lose the metadata, sort of the background information of where it came from, where it went to, who it may have been blind copied, and so on.
During the FBI investigation, Uma Abedin stated she always assumed all of Clinton's communications, regardless of the account, would be subject to Freedom of Information Act if they contained work-related materials.
Quote, Abedin also stated in her FBI interview that Clinton's staff believed relevant emails would be captured and preserved by state if any of the senders or recipients were using an official state email account, right?
So if I email to you and you're using a.gov or state email account, then my sending to you is going to be archived that way.
The state OIG stated in its report that this was not an appropriate method of preserving record emails, and Clinton should have preserved any record emails created and received on her personal account by printing and filing the emails in the office of the secretary.
It should be noted, of course, it strips metadata and so on.
The printing and filing of emails is not the same.
This also, I assume, makes it tougher to search them.
Clinton should have surrendered all emails relating to state business before leaving her post as Secretary of State.
Clinton stated that she received no instructions or direction regarding the preservation or production of records from state during the transition out of her role as Secretary of State in early 2013.
Now, of course, if state knew she was using these private email servers, possibly private devices and so on, I imagine there would have been quite a wrangle about how best to get all of her work-related emails made available for Freedom of Information Act requests.
The Department of State, quote, sent a formal request to former secretaries of state on October 28, 2014, asking them to produce emails related to government work.
At this time, Clinton requested that her attorneys oversee the process of providing Clinton's work-related emails to state, including a review to identify work-related emails.
Clinton was not consulted on specific emails in order to determine if they were work-related.
So, how were Clinton's emails reviewed to determine if they were work-related or personal?
Attorney Heather Samuelson, quote, reviewed the emails over the course of several months and completed it just prior to December 5th, 2014, when hard copies of the work-related emails were turned over, end quote, to the State Department.
Quote, using her laptop to conduct the review, Samuelson placed any work-related emails into a folder that she had created in Microsoft Outlook.
Samuelson first added to this folder all emails sent to or received or from Clinton's personal account.
So I understand she just, I assume, did a search and said, if there's anyone who's sending from.gov or.mil email addresses, we're going to assume that's work-related, and she put it in that folder.
So I think the methodology here is if Hillary Clinton sent or received emails with people with a.gov or.mil email address that was assumed to be work-related.
Quote, Samuelson then searched the remaining emails for the names of state senior leadership as well as any members of Congress, foreign leaders or other official contacts.
Finally, Samuelson reviewed the to, from, and subject fields of every email during this review.
However, she did not read the content of each individual email, indicating that in some instances she made a determination as to whether it was one of Clinton's work or personal emails by only reviewing the to, from, and subject fields of the email.
That's in the FBI report.
So, not reading the contents of each individual email.
Samuelson then printed hard copies of the pre-selected emails and created a.psd file on a USB thumb drive.
On August 6, 2015, this thumb drive was obtained by the FBI from Williams and Connolly via consent from Clinton.
Now, after the original email production to the State Department in December 2014, Clinton told her staff that she no longer needed the emails, but maintained that she, quote, never deleted, nor did she instruct anyone to delete, her emails to avoid complying with FOIA, state or FBI requests for information.
In or around December 2014 or January 2015, a program called Bleach Bit was used to remove Clinton emails from the laptops of the attorneys involved in the archive curations.
In December 2014, Hillary also decided that she no longer needed access to any of her emails older than 60 days.
Due to this instruction, the email retention for ClintonEmail.com email was to be changed to reflect a new policy, but the changes did not actually take place until March 2015.
So she said, all emails deleted older than 60 days, but that didn't happen for a couple of months.
So this created a problem.
On March 2, 2015, the New York Times published an article titled, quote, Hillary Clinton used personal email account at State Department possibly breaking rules.
This article led to a subpoena from the House Select Committee on Benghazi for the preservation and production of emails stored on her private accounts.
In March, the individual contractor responsible for changing the retention time on ClintonEmail.com had a self-described, oh shit, moment and realized that he had not changed the email retention settings as requested.
These available documents were to be preserved under the subpoena, but they should, quote should, have already been deleted as per Hillary Clinton's new guidelines.
Quote, in his interviews with the FBI, this person, name redacted, indicated that sometime between March 25th to 31st, 2015, he realized he did not make the email retention policy changes to Clinton's ClintonEmail.com email account as requested in December 2014.
Quote, in his FBI interview on February 18th, 2016, this person indicated that he did not recall conducting deletions based upon this realization.
Quote, in a follow-up FBI interview on May 3rd, 2016, name redacted, indicated he believed he had an oh-shit moment and sometime between March 25th to 31st, 2015, deleted the Clinton archive mailbox from the PRN server and used Bleachbit, this deletion program, to delete the exported.pst files he had created on the server system containing Clinton's emails.
Quote, investigations found evidence of these deletions and determined that the Dotto backups of the PRN server were also manually deleted during this time frame.
So this is a preservation request under a subpoena.
Quote, investigation identified a PRN work ticket which referenced a conference call, end quote, with former President Bill Clinton's staff which occurred around this time.
The individual contractor, quote, advised during his February 18, 2016 interview that he did not recall seeing the preservation request referenced in the March 9, 2015 email.
Quote, during his May 3, 2016 interview, redacted name, indicated that at the time he made the deletions in March 2015, he was aware of the existence of the preservation request and the fact that it meant he should not disturb Clinton's email data on the PRN server.
During her testimony to the FBI, Hillary Clinton stated that she was unaware of the March 2015 email deletion.
So, did Hillary Clinton have other copies of her old emails?
In spring 2013, Clinton's emails were loaded onto an Apple MacBook and USB thumb drive from the original server.
These two separate email archives were intended to be stored in Hillary's Chappaqua and Whitehaven residences, but this didn't happen, as the laptop and thumb drive were not originally provided to Clinton's staff.
In early 2014, the female archive curator located the laptop at her residence and was reminded of her obligation.
I don't know, maybe she checked under the couch, who knows?
The curator tried to remotely transfer the emails to a Clinton associate, but was unsuccessful, leaving them to simply shipping the laptop to another person via mail, who then attempted to transfer the emails to another server.
To accomplish this, the male associate transferred all of the Clinton email content to a personal Google email or Gmail address that he created and then downloaded all of the email content from the Gmail account into another archive on the new server.
So basically all of this, I guess containing some pretty sensitive material, floated up to the cloud and then floated down from the cloud.
After this transfer, the individual deleted the emails from the laptop, but did not wipe it.
The email archives were also deleted from the newly created Gmail account.
The original laptop was then shipped to an unnamed Clinton associate via United States Postal Service, but it was never received.
The FBI was told that Clinton's staff was moving offices at the time, and it, quote, would have been easy for the package to get lost during the transition period.
Remember, this is a package with some pretty sensitive information that was on it, but unwiped.
The whereabouts of the laptop and thumb drive, both containing classified information, is currently unknown.
So, you know, maybe if you could check under your couch, that would be helpful.
But it doesn't end there, my friends.
It just doesn't.
The FBI identified 940 Clinton emails from October 25, 2010 to December 31, 2010, that as of June 21, 2016, remain within the Gmail account, with 56 of them marked confidential.
Let's just mention that.
So the guy, I think he was supposed to have deleted the Gmail account.
He used to transfer the information, didn't, and they're still up there.
The State Department hasn't received 302 of the 940 Clinton emails found in the Gmail account as they were not provided as required in December 2014.
Of those 302 emails, 18 were disseminated for classification review and one was found to contain confidential information.
The FBI has also used other means in an attempt to recover Hillary Clinton's lost emails.
To date, the FBI has recovered an additional 17,448 unique work-related and personal emails that were not provided as part of Clinton's production to the FBI. That seems like quite a lot.
The investigation identified 13 total mobile devices associated with Clinton's two known phone numbers, which potentially were used to send emails using Clinton's clintonemail.com email addy.
The Department of Justice requested all 13 mobile devices in February 2016, but they were unable to locate them.
As a result, the FBI was unable to acquire or forensically examine any of these devices which likely held classified information.
Who has them and who has access to the information they contain?
Later, two other BlackBerry devices were provided to the FBI, but neither was found to be connected to one of Clinton's personal servers or contained emails from her personal accounts during her tenure as Secretary of State.
The FBI identified five, count them, five iPads associated with Clinton, which potentially were used to send emails from Clinton's ClintonEmail.com email accounts.
The FBI obtained three of the iPads, and only one contained any email data, but it was not classified information.
But what about the other two missing iPads?
We may never know.
Quote, whereabouts of Clinton's devices would frequently become unknown, unquote.
But two instances were recalled where Clinton's devices were destroyed by breaking them in half, or hitting them with a hammer.
The FBI was unable to obtain an original Apple server which housed ClintonEmail.com and thus cannot determine which email accounts were hosted and transferred to the eventual upgraded server.
Now, due to a technical oversight, Clinton's email server was also backed up to an outside commercial-grade cloud storage instead of only locally.
The more this information is spread around, the greater likelihood that it was compromised to some degree.
The FBI didn't request or obtain equipment associated with Clinton's later hrcoffice.com account.
No evidence was found that the account contained or contains potentially classified information or emails from Clinton's tenure as Secretary of State.
So, given how careless Clinton had been with classified information, as Comey mentioned, you'd assume this equipment would be fully investigated.
Why was there no investigation into a possible cover-up attempt after the fact?
The FBI's investigation confirmed that Clinton's immediate staff used their personal email accounts in combination with their state-provided open net email accounts for official state business.
Clinton and her immediate staff were notified of foreign travel risks and were warned that digital threats began immediately upon landing in a foreign country, since connection of a mobile device to a local network provides opportunities for, of course, foreign adversaries to intercept voice and email transmissions.
FBI investigation determined that hundreds of emails classified confidential during the state Freedom of Information Act process were sent or received by Clinton while she was outside the contiguous United States O'Connor's.
On occasions while O'Connor's, Clinton has direct email contact with an email address for President Barack Obama, right?
So, that's not good.
If there's an unsecured device in foreign territory and you're emailing from the Secretary of State to the President, that seems, I'm no expert, that seems like a little bit of a security risk.
State Diplomatic Security Service, DS, instructed Clinton that because her office was in a sensitive compartmented information facility, or SCIF, the use of mobile devices in her office was prohibited.
Interviews with three former DS agents reveal Clinton stored her personal BlackBerry in a desk drawer, which was located within the skiff on Mahogany Row.
Now, Clinton had requested a secure BlackBerry and later an iPad to receive communications in her office.
However, both requests were denied.
She continued to use her unsecured BlackBerry despite full knowledge.
It was inappropriate to do so, as evident by her denied requests.
I guess it's the old theory that it's better to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission.
According to the state OIG report, state employees alleged that John Bentle, then director of S-ES-IRM, discouraged employees from raising concerns about Clinton's use of personal email.
When interviewed by the FBI, Bentle denied that state employees raised concerns about Clinton's email to him, that he discouraged employees from discussing it, or that he was aware, during Clinton's tenure, that she was using a personal email account or server to conduct official state business.
Quote, the FBI investigation determined that some Clinton aides and senior-level state employees were aware Clinton used a personal email address for state business during her tenure.
Quote, Clinton had told the FBI it was common knowledge at state that she had a private email address because it was displayed to anyone with whom she exchanged emails.
So we talked about this before in our presentation, which we'll link below, the truth about Hillary Clinton's email controversy.
Quote, But it's sort of like a radiating web.
If you are aware that somebody is using personal email or a non-secured or non-official email for official business, if you're copied on it, then you're kind of aware of it.
I think you're supposed to bring it to people's attention.
So there's kind of like a house of cards here around this.
Quote, however, some state employees interviewed by the FBI explained that emails from Clinton only contained the letter H in the sender field and did not display her email address.
Clinton's immediate aides, including Uma Abedin, who had a ClintonEmail.com email address, told the FBI they were unaware of the existence of the private server until after Clinton's tenure at state or when it became public knowledge.
Clinton claimed that her private email usage was common knowledge at the State Department.
However, Uma Abedin, who had a ClintonEmail.com email account and exchanged many emails with Clinton, claimed to have had no idea about the private server conducting state business until after her time, after Hillary's time as Secretary of State.
Believe of that what you will.
On July 2, 2016, the FBI interviewed Clinton.
Clinton was aware she was an original classification authority, or OCA, at state.
However, she could not recall how often she used this authority, nor could she recall any training or guidance provided by the state.
On January 23rd, 2009, Clinton signed a classified information non-disclosure agreement which read, quote, I hereby acknowledge that I have received a security indoctrination concerning the nature and protection of classified information.
The disclosure form also notes the classified information is not always marked, but is still regulated by this agreement, right?
So we mentioned this before in a previous presentation.
Even if it's not marked like super-duper classified, you're still responsible for knowing that it's classified because you've received the training and you have knowledge of it and treating it in an appropriate manner.
Clinton could not give an example of how the classification of a document was determined.
Rather, she stated, Quote, Quote, When
asked what the parenthetical C meant before a paragraph within the captioned email, Clinton stated she did not know and could only speculate it was referencing paragraphs marked in alphabetical order.
Clinton could not say for sure if the parenthetical C is used for portion marking classified documents.
Clinton understood the top of the email is marked confidential and asked the interviewing agent if that was what C referenced.
I'm not sure the training entirely took in this situation.
Clinton said she received no instructions or direction regarding the preservation or production of records from the State Department during the transition out of her role as Secretary of State in 2013.
However, in December of 2012, Clinton suffered a concussion and then, around the new year, had a blood clot.
Based on her doctor's advice, she could only work at state for a few hours a day and could not recall every briefing she received.
Now again, I'm no expert, but I've got to think that that would be pretty important information to bring to the American public and perhaps put her on a leave of absence until her medical issues get better.
I just don't know that you want to have a Secretary of State who can only work a few hours a day and can't recall every briefing she received.
In the FBI notes regarding Hillary Clinton's testimony, Clinton claimed that she could not recall issues related to her email server at least 39 times.
So, here are some things that Hillary Clinton did not recall.
Being briefed on how to handle classified information.
Receiving security clearance.
How many times she designated items classified.
How to select a drone strike target.
Briefing on handling top secret special access program materials.
Receiving emails that should not be on a private server.
Directing the creation of a private email account.
Getting guidance from the Department of State on email policy.
The process for deleting emails.
Getting a message that her storage was almost full.
people other than Uma being offered a private email account.
How data was destroyed when she switched devices.
Amount of times her staff were given a secure phone.
Why she did not receive a secure BlackBerry as requested.
Who had access to her BlackBerry and much, much more.
I was hoping to do that in one breath.
I really didn't think I'd make it.
So, what can we say?
Well, from the report, quote, United States intelligence community, USIC, agencies determined that 81 email chains, which FBI investigation determined were transmitted and stored in Clinton's unclassified personal service systems, contained classified information ranging from the confidential to top contained classified information ranging from the confidential to top secret slash special access program levels at the time they were sent between 2009 and 2013.
Quote, USIC agencies determined that 68 of these email chains remain classified.
Quote, in addition, the classification determination process administered by the US Department of State in connection with the Freedom of Information Act litigation identified approximately 2,000 additional emails currently classified as confidential and one email currently classified secret. additional emails currently classified as confidential and one email currently which FBI investigation determined were transmitted and stored on at least two of Clinton's personal server systems.
Quote, investigative limitations, including the FBI's inability to obtain all mobile devices and various computer components associated with Clinton's personal email systems, prevented the FBI from conclusively determining whether the classified information transmitted and stored on Clinton's personal service systems was compromised prevented the FBI from conclusively determining whether the classified information transmitted and stored on Clinton's personal
Quote, the FBI did find that hostile foreign actors successfully gained access to the personal email accounts of individuals with whom Clinton was in regular contact, and in doing so obtained emails sent or received by Clinton on her personal account.
So I guess the question looking forward down the tunnel of time is...
Do American voters want another four years of this kind of stuff, of this kind of incompetence and failure to remember, and what James Comey characterized as extreme carelessness when it came to the handling of highly classified, highly sensitive, highly important lives depend on it, strategic military and diplomatic decisions depend on it.
Do we really want this stuff floating around in UPS, being delivered, not being delivered, being left lying around?
It seems that that's A pretty important characteristic.
Do we want someone whose major job is the handling or at least control of secure information, of classified information, saying, well, I don't really remember the training about how I was supposed to handle it.
I don't really know how it's classified.
That seems like you're kind of missing the point of the job.
And when you look at how the media is dealing with this stuff, it is, of course, being underreported in the largely Democrat-friendly mainstream media.
When you compare this to things like Trump stakes and all of the other nonsense that goes around about, ooh, Trump may have done something slightly squidgy at some point in the past, that just seems to be not exactly an equal scale of importance and focus.
So, So this is Stefan Molyneux from Free Domain Radio.
Thank you so much for watching.
Please help out the show at freedomainradio.com slash donate if you find this kind of information helpful.
And it was burning the midnight oil to extract all of this information from the reports that came out recently.
So thanks again so much for watching and for listening.
