Final q & a

Attached and the relevant part is pasted below.

CORE LANGUAGE FOR ALL ANSWERS:

 

LONG VERSION

 

·      Let me explain what happened.

 

·      After I’d left the State Department, we got a request in October 2014 for all my work related emails.  By the way, the same request also went to all the other former Secretaries of State.

 

·      The request went to my personal attorneys, so I asked them to be in charge of sorting the emails.  They conducted an extremely thorough process that took weeks, going through every email, to make sure that we turned over to the State Department all the work related emails. When it was a close call, the team erred on the side of considering the email work-related and gave it to State. In fact, the State Department has already found 1200 emails that they want to send back to us because they say they were actually personal.

 

·      After the work emails were turned over, in December, we had to decide what to do with the rest. Because the government already had everything that was work-related, and my personal emails were just that -- personal -- I didn’t see a reason to keep them so I asked that they be deleted, and that’s what the company that managed my server did. And we notified Congress of that back in March.

 

 

SHORT VERSION

 

·      Let me explain.  Last year, the State Department asked me to send them all my work related emails.  We set up a thorough process to sort the work from the personal – it took weeks.  After we handed over to the State Department all the work related emails, we had to decide what to do with the rest that were personal.  I didn’t see a reason to keep them so I asked that they be deleted, and that’s what the company that had my server did. And we notified Congress of that back in March.

Possible Questions

 

Why won’t you say whether you wiped it?

 

·      I have said this before, but let me be clear, after we went through the process to determine what was work related and what was not and provided the work related emails to State, I decided not to keep the personal ones.   We saved the work-related ones on a thumb drive that is now with the Department of Justice.  And as I said in March, I chose not to keep the personal ones.  I asked that they be deleted, how that happened was up to the company that managed the server.  And they are cooperating fully with anyone that has questions.

 

·      I think that most reasonable people would agree that we are all entitled to some level of privacy, particularly when it comes to my private conversations with long-time friends and family. 

 

 

Did you wipe the server, yes or no?

 

·      I asked that they be deleted, how that happened was up to the company that managed the server.  And they are cooperating fully with anyone that has questions.

 

·      The work emails I had were saved on a thumb drive, which we have given to the Justice Department.  I also turned everything over in paper form to State as they requested.  As I have said, I think we have been as transparent as possible.