The Obama administration is trying to stonewall Judicial Watch's efforts to obtain Hillary Clinton's emails from the private account she used while secretary of state, the conservative advocacy group is charging.
According to the group, the Justice Department is bucking Judicial Watch's request for a status conference in its case, claiming there's no need for a hearing until at least late April.
"Time is of the essence in this case," Judicial Watch said it responded, according to a
statement from the group. "The statement by former Secretary Clinton during a press
conference that she did not preserve approximately 30,000 emails she sent or received
through her non-'state.gov' email address she used exclusively to conduct government
business is a matter of public record — not [as the State Department alleged] 'conjecture.'"
Judicial Watch initially sued the State Department in early March, demanding it turn over email exchanges and other communications between Clinton and the wife of ousted Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi — just as the government said
Clinton used a personal email account to conduct official business instead of a government account while she served as secretary of state.
The lawsuit is before U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth, a Reagan appointee — who handled some of Judicial Watch's most famous cases during President Bill Clinton's tenure,
Politico reports.
"The State Department has yet to demonstrate how it is satisfying its obligations under
FOIA in light of recent revelations that Secretary Clinton’s emails were not being
properly managed, retained and produced," the group now argues, according to a
statement released Thursday.
"Had Judicial Watch not challenged the State Department’s search, this case would most
likely have been dismissed before any public revelations were made about the unlawful
arrangement relating to the State Department’s handling of agency emails during
Secretary Clinton’s tenure at the State Department … " the group argues.
Judicial Watch also said it rejects the assertion Clinton’s removal of non-State Department related records would prevent them from being subject to the Freedom of Information Act, pointing to its Clinton administration-era lawsuit in which Lamberth sided with Judicial Watch in seeking certain Department of Commerce records.
"The Obama administration’s fraud, misconduct and misrepresentation on the Hillary Clinton email scandal continues in federal court," Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said in the statement.
"Our independent litigation exposed the email scandal and just forced, for the first time, the Obama administration to admit accountability for at least some of the records Hillary Clinton concealed from the American people."
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