Lyin’ Susan Rice
Once again Judicial Watch is doing the heavy lifting.
Conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch announced Thursday it submitted a court-ordered discovery plan seeking depositions from top Obama officials involved in Hillary Clinton’s email scandal including Susan Rice and Ben Rhodes.
The discovery plan stems from a December, 2018 ruling by Judge Royce Lamberth ordering the State Department and DOJ to submit discovery in three areas.
Judge Lamberth called Clinton’s use of the private email server “one of the gravest modern offenses to government transparency.”
Via Judicial Watch:
The plan for discovery is the latest development in Judicial Watch’s July 2014 FOIA lawsuit filed after the U.S. Department of State failed to respond to a May 13, 2014 FOIA request (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of State (No. 1:14-cv-01242)). Judicial Watch seeks:
- Copies of any updates and/or talking points given to Ambassador Rice by the White House or any federal agency concerning, regarding, or related to the September 11, 2012 attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya.
- Any and all records or communications concerning, regarding, or relating to talking points or updates on the Benghazi attack given to Ambassador Rice by the White House or any federal agency.
Judicial Watch seeks the depositions of former U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice and former White House Deputy Strategic Communications Adviser Ben Rhodes about the creation and dissemination of the infamous Benghazi talking points because: “No one other than these individuals know better who they were communicating with and where records might be located.”
Judicial Watch also argues for “direct, unfiltered access to [additional] key witnesses with firsthand knowledge and the opportunity to ask follow-up questions” about the illicit Clinton email system. In its pursuit of answers as to whether former Secretary Clinton’s use of a private email server was intended to stymie FOIA, Judicial Watch seeks to conduct the following depositions:
- Jacob Sullivan, Senior advisor and Deputy Chief of Staff throughout Secretary Clinton’s tenure.
- Clarence Finney (Deputy Director, Executive Secretariat Staff)” the principal advisor and records management expert in the Office of the Secretary who was responsible for control of all correspondence and records for Clinton and other State Department officials.” Finney is also among the State Department officials in the emails discussing the processing of the CREW FOIA request and other requests concerning the former Secretary’s email account.
- Jonathon Wasser, who worked for Finney and who actually conducted searches for records in response to FOIA requests …”
- FBI Assistant Director for Counterintelligence E.W. Priestap, “who supervised the Clinton email investigation.” Priestap has not explained “the nature or extent of the FBI’s efforts, such as who the FBI attempted to contact, who the FBI actually talked to, who the FBI requested records from, who actually provided records, and whether the FBI believes those that they requested records from actually returned all of the requested records.”
- Justin Cooper (employee of President Bill Clinton and the Clinton Foundation). Cooper created and managed the clintonemail.com server. His testimony to Congress also appears to contradict portions of testimony provided by former Clinton aide Huma Abedin.
- Eric Boswell (Assistant Secretary for Diplomatic Security). On March 6, 2009, Boswell wrote in an Information Memo to Cheryl Mills that he “cannot stress too strongly … that any unclassified BlackBerry is highly vulnerable in any setting to remotely and covertly monitoring conversations, retrieving email, and exploiting calendars.” A March 11, 2009 email states that, in a management meeting with the assistant secretaries, Secretary Clinton approached Boswell and mentioned she had read the IM and that she “got it.”
- Heather Samuelson (Senior Advisor & White House Liaison). Until her tenure at the State Department ended in March 2013, Samuelson was tasked with tracking the FOIA request served by CREW. Samuelson subsequently served as one of Secretary Clinton’s personal attorneys and, in 2014, reviewed the clintonemail.com account to identify federal records. The records returned by Clinton in December 2014 were records identified by Samuelson.
The DOJ is colluding with Hillary Clinton’s cronies to limit discovery.
Justice Department attorneys fighting Judicial Watch’s discovery admitted in a filing that “Counsel for State contacted the counsel of some third parties that Plaintiff originally included in its draft discovery proposal to obtain their client’s position on being deposed.”
President of Judicial Watch Tom Fitton had this to say about the DOJ colluding with Clinton allies to protect Hillary:
“President Trump, frankly, should demand to know why the State and Justice Department are colluding with Clinton allies and trying to protect Hillary Clinton and themselves from court-ordered questions on the Clinton email scandal. But a federal court wants answers – and Judicial Watch discovery plan is a key step to uncovering whether and how Hillary Clinton email misconduct stymied FOIA.”
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