Posted on 04/11/2007 1:54:42 PM PDT by Sub-Driver
Bush aides' use of GOP e-mail probed
By JENNIFER LOVEN, Associated Press Writer 17 minutes ago
Congressional investigators are probing why aides to President Bush used Republican Party-sponsored e-mail accounts to help plan the administration's ouster of eight federal prosecutors.
They are questioning whether the use of nongovernmental e-mail accounts was proof that the firings were political. They also want to know if White House officials are purposely conducting sensitive official presidential business via nongovernmental accounts to get around a law requiring preservation — and eventual disclosure — of presidential records.
The investigators are seeking copies of any e-mails sent from or to these accounts that are related to the dismissal of the U.S. attorneys.
The White House says there's no attempt to hide anything.
The accounts were set up for about 20 Bush aides — such as Karl Rove and his deputies — who get involved in politics, spokesman Scott Stanzel said. Having the Republican National Committee create non-White House addresses and provide separate BlackBerries, laptops and other communications gear was designed to avoid running afoul of Hatch Act rules barring federal employees from engaging in political activities with government resources or on government time, he said.
Under President Clinton, White House aides used separate equipment for political spadework but did not have separate accounts.
"This is entirely appropriate," Stanzel said of the Bush White House practice.
Moreover, he said, all e-mails to and from the accounts have been excluded since 2004 from the Republican National Committee's automatic deletion policy, in which e-mails typically are expunged after 30 days.
The White House has promised to look through its staffers' e-mails for anything relevant to the prosecutors' matter. No matter the domain name, documents will be provided to the Senate and House Judiciary committees
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
“Under President Clinton, White House aides used separate equipment for political spadework but did not have separate accounts.”
And Loven, of course, would know. I wonder how much the Clintons are paying her to write this stuff.
If they are using these accounts to communicate any national security things or even communications between Rove and the President or about the President, it represents a huge security risk IMO. Not too hard for the Chinese or Russians to hack RNC accounts or capture RNC mail I don’t imagine.
Paging Claude Rains.
Uh folks, why would it be better to use government email accounts to handle political business??
All these stories sound bad if you read the headline real fast, but there is nothing there. All the emails were retained and we all know how easy it is to create and use tons of email accounts.
Gee, could a political appointment be political????
“Under President Clinton, White House aides used separate equipment for political spadework but did not have separate accounts.”
Yeah, someone’s going to have to explain to me how the unaudited “Mail2” server was accidental.
Jennifer Loven = AP press hack for the Demagogues
Everything she writes looks like a press release from the DNC
I suppose it’s because everything she writes IS basically a presser from the DNC
...was designed to avoid running afoul of Hatch Act rules barring federal employees from engaging in political activities with government resources or on government time....
Gosh — dont ya think that if they are afraid of transgressing the Hatch act, they might be paying fairly close attention to mixing national security and political activities????
Hee...hee.
“If they are using these accounts to communicate any national security things or even communications between Rove and the President or about the President, it represents a huge security risk IMO. Not too hard for the Chinese or Russians to hack RNC accounts or capture RNC mail I don’t imagine.”
We used to have a saying in military intelligence that went something like this: “If you throw a top secret technical manual over the Berlin Wall, the Soviets will throw it back five minutes later with the changes posted.”
Here we go again with the latest non-scandal scandal. It seems that the Dems’ strategy is just to shout “Scandal! Scandal!” and hope that the impression of scandal sticks in the public’s mind, despite the lack of substance to any of these scandals.
The linked article has been updated - the White House is now saying it has "mishandled Republican Party-sponsored e-mail accounts used by nearly two dozen presidential aides, resulting in the loss of an undetermined number of e-mails concerning official White House business."
There is something called the Presidential Records Act. Those emails are the property of the United States Government, and due to the RNC's retention policy prior to 2004, such emails were automatically deleted in violation of the PRA, and users were allowed to delete them, also a violation. I believe White House policy also says that ALL emails must be stored on White House systems to ensure proper archival in accordance with the law.
I guess we didn't learn our lesson from Clinton.
Looks like prima facie evidence of a violation of 44 USC, Chapter 22.
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