According to the law, there are five elements that must be met for a violation of the statute, and they can all be found in section (a) of the statute: “(1) Whoever, being an officer, employee, contractor, or consultant of the United States, and, (2) by virtue of his office, employment, position, or contract, becomes possessed of documents or materials containing classified information of the United States, (3) knowingly removes such documents or materials (4) without authority and (5) with the intent to retain such documents or materials at an unauthorized location [shall be guilty of this offense].”
The Petraeus case meets those conditions. Does Clinton’s?
Clinton originally denied that any of her e-mails contained classified information, but soon abandoned that claim. So far, 150 e-mails containing classified information have been identified on her server, including two that included information determined to be Top Secret.
She then fell back on the claim that none of the e-mails in question were “marked classified” at the time she was dealing with them. The marking is not what makes the material classified; it’s the nature of the information itself. As secretary of state, Clinton knew this, and in fact she would have been re-briefed annually on this point as a condition of maintaining her clearance to access classified information.
Then there’s location. Clinton knowingly set up her e-mail system to route 100 percent of her e-mails to and through her unsecured server (including keeping copies stored on the server). She knowingly removed such documents and materials from authorized locations (her authorized devices and secure government networks) to an unauthorized location (her server).
Read the rest at The New York Post
Very, VERY early on in this drama, it was clear, obvious and demonstrable that Hillary violated security procedures and, thus, broke the law. No doubts can remain, only excuses. As the article states, it remains to be seen if Hillary will be prosecuted (I have my guess) but one thing is for certain; not only should she never have been Secretary of State, but by no means should be she be considered as a viable candidate for the Presidency of the United States.
@Bill: If she was not a liberal, she would have been charged already. There are different rules followed by this administration for liberals and for conservatives. Look at how quick Petraeus was charged.
It has yet to be demonstrated that any material on Hillary Clinton’s server was classified at the time emails were sent or received. Classification occurred later, when documents were being reviewed for public release. That’s because classification is the only way to prevent sensitive but unclassified information from being made public.
Perhaps it would have been better if Hillary Clinton had followed the lead of the Bush administration and arranged for the server and all information on it to disappear without a trace. It seems to be no big deal when that happens.
@Greg: Nearly every email that the Sec of State is classified. She didn’t have to have it marked. Standard/required annual briefings by the security officer enlightens all State Department employees about what information should be secured by classification. It is quite evident that this guidance was ignored by Clinton. When are you going to take up my bet Greg? Your lack of knowledge of national security issues is appalling. You should be embarrassed by your continuous defense of Clinton.
@Greg: It HAS been shown that the classified information was classified when it was generated. So, therefore, Hillary sent, received and stored sensitive, classified information from, to and on an unsecured server. If she did this unknowingly then it was because she is stupid… which is not an acceptable defense. The only reason it was not MARKED classified is because of her illegal server; it never went THROUGH the State Department to BE marked.
This isn’t that hard, Greg.
@Randy, #4:
Nonsense. Classified documents are clearly identified as such. Sensitive but Not Classified is a lower category that is far more common and precisely what the header says. The bulk of inter- and intra-departmental messages are routine administrative communications, and many emails are personal communications having little or nothing to do with official matters.
@Bill, #5:
No, this HAS NOT been shown. People repeatedly say that, but they never seem to be able to provide the supporting evidence. If there is such, it will eventually be presented.
Presently Clinton’s enemies are capitalizing on the fact that the results of official investigations have not been publicly reported. If the results are negative, they will immediately begin asserting that the FBI or the DOJ or whatever are part of a cover-up. I know the drill, having seen it repeated again and again.
@Greg:
Greg
Are you really asserting that Hillary doesn’t know spy satellite intel is inherently top secret? Is she really that stupid?
@Greg:
Tell me, Greg; if some information goes directly from a foreign emissary or one of her flaky aids to her secret, unsecured server, how would it get MARKED “Classified”? In fact, what WAS the reason to have a secret, unsecured server to carry on ALL State Department business on? You have some sort of semi-believable hypothesis for that bit of stupidity? I have my thoughts, but I bet YOUR explanation is quite entertaining.
Perhaps you should ask George W. Bush or DIck Cheney, since they conducted official White House business on Republican National Committee servers. You could compare responses.
Of course there’s a big difference. Hillary Clinton has furnished copies of her official correspondence. The Bush White House didn’t. Correspondence of 51 of the 88 White House officials using non-government accounts for official correspondence wasn’t backed up.
White House: Millions of e-mails may be missing
@Greg: If all the emails are gone, how do you know they conducted “White House business”? What was the “White House business”? Ordering fast food? Paying the water bill online? Besides, as you yourself say, if there is no indictment, there was no crime. Look at that great big, RED “may” there. When you have another liberal caught laying national secrets leaving on the front seat of her unlocked car in downtown Bejing, blame Bush. We get it.
Meanwhile, stick to the topic; why would a Secretary of State conduct ALL official business on a secret, private, unsecured server?
@DrJohn:
My career field in the Air Force was in remote command, control, remote piloting of, and data collection and processing from spy satellites. Specifically the DSP birds (We also handled the DMSP spacecraft missions.) Such data is automatically considered classified due to the spacecraft’s capabilities, it’s black-box communications and processing systems, and resolution quality alone. The strategic importance of the data bears additional classification of it’s own. I have already tried to dissuade Greg from his utter ignorance over the classification of such data. He insists on playing the “useful idiot,” which forces me to conclude that he is either: (1) A complete fool not worthy of our attention. or (2) Purposely pretending to be stupid, in his position as a Democrat operative.
Whichever, Greg is, the one thing that is clear is that he is a complete waste of our time and efforts. I don’t suffer fools lightly and have precious little patience for preposterous jackassery from progressive trolls. Were it up to me, Greg would have been history long ago. I don’t know why the moderators put up with his duplicity. I can only surmise he serves their sense of humor as their motley fool, a caricaturist rendering representing the pathetic low-information buffoonery that the progressive-left has collected as it’s base.
Hillary has Sovereign Immunity.
She is Queen, you know.
She can do no wrong.
@Greg:
Greg, how many State Department emails have you been party to? Just to access the server to send and receive emails I had to have a TS SCI clearance to communicate with State Department officials on even the most mundane topics. As I said before, there is an annual mandatory security briefing for all government employees to include the State Department. Not all classified information is marked. It is up to the individual sending and receiving information to recognize that information requires security. Sending official information by an un-vetted server is a clear violation of information security. You need to stop commenting on issues which you have little or no knowledge. I guess that would mean you would need to stop commenting on most everything we discuss here..
@Ditto:
No truer words gave ever been spoken.
@Randy: You are dealing with a shithouse lawyer.
@another vet:
At best!
@Randy:
The transmission of Top Secret information is generally restricted to highly secured communication channels. Since they’re not used for routine communications, the bulk of what passes over them will not be representational of typical inter- and intra-departmental messages.
@Greg:
Well, there you go. Why did Hillary have a private, secret, unsecured server?
@Bill: The server was only secret to Hillary.
@Greg: greg. Is was proven she had compartmented TS ( SI and TK) on her server. I have held both of these clearances plus more and this is serious. In addition Russia, China and Iran HACKED the server and have the information. Her actions whether through stupidity or arrogance are illegal. Lesser men and women have been tried, convicted and jailed for aiding and abetting the enemy. In otherwords committed treason. Every time I read your responses I wonder where your loyalties lie.
@Bill, #18:
Clinton’s choice to use a private server was entirely legal. She was free to make that choice, so she did.
So far the only classified information on her server seems to consist of email that was classified retroactively, when the release of material never intended for public display was mandated in response to Freedom of Information Act requests. Some information the intelligence community has claimed to refer to Top Secret programs and sources was already common knowledge.
I will revise my appraisal that this is only the latest in growing list of fabricated scandals when and if specific claims are supported by actual evidence.
@Enchanted, #20:
No, it HAS NOT been proven, and repeatedly claiming that it has been does not make it so. Your own or my own past security clearance statuses have absolutely no bearing on that fact.
There’s no evidence of that, either. For all anyone knows, the relative obscurity of Clinton’s email server may have resulted in less vulnerability than some official government servers or high profile public servers, the hacking of which have been in the news with regularity of late. In any case, if they were following her email they may have had inside information regarding Chelsea’s wedding plans, but that doesn’t mean they also stole classified information. Classified information would have to have been there to begin with.
@Greg:
But WHY did she forgo using the State Department email system and use her own, private, secret, unsecured server? Why did she do something she harshly criticized others for doing, Greg? You are BOUND to have some hypothesis for this strange behavior.
And, no, you are wrong about the classified information. It may have been MARKED classified later, but then again, it had no opportunity to be marked with any level of classification when it never went through the proper State Department channels, did it? We KNOW that there were emails about N. Korea’s nuclear program. We KNOW that Huma and Hillary sent emails back and forth about Hillary’s travel plans…. a security violation. We KNOW that classified information from Hillary’s emails were handed over and kept on a flash drive by Blumenthal, who has NO SECURITY CLEARANCE. By they way, Obama told Hillary not to hire Blumenthal… but she did it anyway.
And we now know Hillary did not, as she testified under oath and penalty of perjury turn over all the emails she was required to turn over. Not only did she lie, but she lied knowing she was perjuring herself… obviously she simply does not care, having lived above the laws for as long as she has.
Greg… Hillary has illegality all OVER the place. There is no doubt… not a smidgen of doubt… that she broke not only laws but security regulations. She is not qualified to be a crossing guard, much less President.
@Bill:
Please do not put down crossing guards!
@Bill: And why did she use it exclusively?
@Greg:
She was not approved to use a private server for classified information. She failed to secure classified information, that is the charge. What do you not understand? No one is allowed to use a private server for classified information.
Dummy, information that was classified retroactively is information that Clinton was informed about in her annual security briefings. She chose to ignore laws concerning information security which is a felony!
@Randy, #25:
The emails that passed through Clinton’s server only became classified recently. Such classification became necessary because of the investigation. Those out to bring down Clinton have forced the State Department to make public internal communications that were never intended to be put on public display. The fact that it was below a threshold that would have required it to be formally designated as classified from the beginning doesn’t mean it’s in the country’s best interest to pin it all up on a bulletin board for the entire world to see.
When did it become normal for a political party to demand that internal State Department communications be put on public display in order to prove that the Secretary of State is not guilty of malfeasance? Is crazy now considered normal?
These nitwits are are themselves the risk. Their zeal to find ways to destroy their political opponents has led them to seriously impair the function of the government, both domestically and in the area of foreign affairs, while their own positive contribution to the process of effective governance has become virtually nonexistent. “Worse than useless” is becoming an understatement.
And what are they offering, if their scandal and anger mongering allow them to regain full control of government? Increased likelihood of another war, perhaps, when we couldn’t pay for the last one. A historic roll-back of women’s rights to control their own reproductive function. And another round of hefty tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires, of course, sold to the rubes with a promise that they’ll be thrown a handful of peanuts. Trump’s tax plan would cut top-end tax rates by an additional 15 percent, at a calculated cost of $9 trillion more in debt over the next 10 years.
So tell me again who’s the dummy.
@Greg: Greg, I am right and you are not. If you are so sure of yourself, then take my bet or just shut up!