Michael Mukasey: Hillary Showed No 'Common Sense' in Email Scandal

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By    |   Tuesday, 18 August 2015 05:58 PM EDT ET

Former U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey tells Newsmax TV that Hillary Clinton should have used "common sense" in handling sensitive government material in emails, which are now the subject of an FBI investigation.

"This is a matter of common sense. If you're the highest-ranking foreign policy official in the administration and you're talking about our relationships with foreign countries, you're talking about defense questions that relate to our relationships with foreign countries, you have to know that that information is sensitive and therefore classified," Mukasey said Tuesday on "The Steve Malzberg Show."

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Clinton, the presumed Democratic presidential candidate, is being investigated by the FBI over her use of a private email address and server as secretary of state — and the possibility that top secret materials were exchanged on the unsecured system.

Court documents filed Monday showed federal investigators, who are combing through Clinton's email server, have flagged more than 300 emails that passed through her email account that may have contained classified information. A thumbnail drive of some of the emails was being kept by Clinton's high-powered lawyer David Kendall.

And Mukasey, a partner at the international law firm of Debevoise & Plimpton, told Malzberg he doubts Kendall had clearance to have possession of those emails.

"I doubt that he had security clearance, number one, but number two, even if he did, his office certainly is not an authorized place to keep that material. So that is a problem as well," Mukasey said.

Clinton's handling of email has been compared by some to the scandal that surrounded Gen. David Petraeus, the former CIA director and decorated four star Army general who pled guilty to mishandling classified information after his affair with a younger woman was uncovered.

Asked about that comparison, Mukasey told Steve Malzberg:

"That depends on the state of mind with which she acted and the purpose with which she acted. David Petraeus was charged with keeping information in a place where it was not authorized to be kept. That's the lowest level of offense on the scale here.

"He obviously was the one who kept it there, he intended that it be kept there, and it was not authorized that it was kept there. There, as it turns out, was his home.

"If she kept information, if she caused information to be kept on a server where it was not authorized to be kept, then yes, she was responsible. But they'd have to show that she was responsible for having the information on that server and essentially knew what was on there."

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Former U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey tells Newsmax TV that Hillary Clinton should have used "common sense" in handling sensitive government material in emails, which are now the subject of an FBI investigation.
michael mukasey, hillary clinton, email, server
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2015-58-18
Tuesday, 18 August 2015 05:58 PM
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