By Melissa Li
The 2016 presidential hopefuls have been dogged by lurid scandals this past year. From Chris Christie’s Bridgegate to Scott Walker’s supporters’ voter fraud, these accusations have resulted in media field days and a subsequent fall from grace for their unfortunate victims. So far, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has avoided bad press by literally generating no press, constantly dodging the question of whether or not she’ll run for president in 2016. Nevertheless, her Super PAC, Ready For Hillary, has already raised over $9 million for her “possible” campaign, and it’s expected she will formally announce candidacy later this year.
But even Hillary can’t dodge the media forever, and her current email scandal is generating buzz that may harm her upcoming presidential bid. It was recently revealed that she used a private email account for official government correspondences during her four years as Secretary of State. At the time, this was approved by the State Department. When her term ended, her office identified all work-related emails and turned them over to the state. This came to 30,490 of the 62,320 total emails she sent over her tenure. Republicans are currently claiming that her use of private email both endangered national security and blocked government conspiracy.
In last Tuesday’s press conference, Hillary spoke out about her private email account, stating it was simply for the sake of convenience. She’s asked the State, rather reluctantly, to release all 30,000+ government-related emails to the public. But her accusers wonder what happened to the other half of her emails, which were “private, personal messages” Ms. Clinton deleted before handing everything else over to the State Department. Reince Priebus, chairman of the Republican National Committee, overtly suggested that Hillary wasn’t completely honest: “Because only Hillary Clinton controls her personal email account and admitted she deleted many of her emails, no one but Hillary Clinton knows if she handed over every relevant email.”
But the scandal doesn’t end there. The Associated Press is now levying a lawsuit against the State Department over Clinton’s emails. AP claims the State Department has “failed to respond substantively” to five requests for release of emails relating to the Benghazi terror attacks and Osama bin Laden raid.
