WASHINGTON — Hillary Clinton urged the State Department to release the emails she wrote from a private email account as secretary of state, weighing in on a controversy that has generated negative attention this week for the likely Democratic presidential candidate.
In a tweet late Wednesday, Clinton said, “I want the public to see my email. I asked State to release them. They said they will review them for release as soon as possible.”
I want the public to see my email. I asked State to release them. They said they will review them for release as soon as possible.
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) March 5, 2015
State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said in response to Clinton’s tweet that the department will review for release the emails Clinton provided. Harf said the department will conduct the review as quickly as possible, but said it could take some time to review, given the sheer volume of emails.
Clinton’s public comment Wednesday came after she didn’t address the matter during a speech on Tuesday, and she still hasn’t explained why she used her own server and eschewed a State Department email address.
Her use of a personal email account for State Department business has prompted questions about her transparency, and Republicans criticized her over it.
The chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, Utah Republican Jason Chaffetz, plans to investigate whether Clinton may have violated federal requirements that written communications of officials are preserved. The committee will join with a special committee investigating the 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya, which issued subpoenas Wednesday for Clinton’s emails when she was secretary of state.
The controversy has dominated White House briefings for two consecutive days.
Clinton’s team said this week she acted no differently from her predecessors at the State Department who also used private email addresses.
Last year, Clinton provided the State Department 55,000 pages of emails after the department asked her and other former secretaries for records that should be preserved. Yet her team alone decided what would be turned over and should not, without any outside control or clarity on how those decisions were made.
FREDERIC J. FROMMER, Associated Press
