A conservative watchdog group posed 25 questions to Hillary Clinton on Tuesday concerning her use of a private email server while at the State Department, following a federal judge’s order that she respond to written questions under oath.
The questions from Judicial Watch, which has relentlessly pursued information about Clinton’s email setup, deal largely with the nature and creation of her bespoke email system and the prospect that it might have been vulnerable to hackers.
{mosads}The group also asks whether Clinton expected to have to comply with provisions of the Freedom of Information Act, and whether her email system thwarted public access to government material.
“These are simple questions about her email system that we hope will finally result in straight-forward answers, under oath, from Hillary Clinton,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said in a statement.
The Democratic presidential nominee now has until Sept. 29 to respond in writing to the questions. A federal judge earlier this month denied an effort to demand Clinton answer questions in person, claiming that follow-up questions would be unnecessary.
The list of 25 questions (see below) submitted on Tuesday confronts Clinton with emails released by the State Department over the course of the last year and a half, showing a deliberate effort to use her private email setup instead of a State Department email account.
In 2009, for instance, a senior diplomatic security official warned a senior Clinton staffer that “any unclassified BlackBerry is highly vulnerable in any setting.”
In 2010, the then-secretary of State offered to “get [a] separate address or device” after her emails appeared to have been blocked by spam filters. She ultimately stayed with her personal setup.
And in 2011, a message went to all State Department staffers under Clinton’s name asking them to “[a]void conducting official department business from your personal email accounts,” even though she herself used only a personal email account for work purposes.
Clinton’s upcoming response to the questions will likely renew the political fury that has dogged her for more than a year.
The Clinton campaign has been unable to calm concerns about her email setup, even after the Justice Department in July announced that it would not press criminal charges for mishandling classified information. The department did not examine questions about possible violations of the Freedom of Information Act.
Assuming Clinton meets the Sept. 29 deadline to respond to the questions, her answers will likely become public in the weeks immediately ahead of Nov. 8, ensuring that the controversy trails her until Election Day.