After ignoring demands from Republicans in Congress to turn over the personal email server that she used with her unusual electronic mail setup while Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton ordered her attorney to hand over that device to the Justice Department, which is reviewing whether she sent top secret material in unsecured communications.
"She directed her team to give her email server that was used during her tenure as Secretary to the Department of Justice," said Clinton campaign spokesman Nick Merill in a statement.
Also handed over to investigators were thumb drives that held electronic copies of the emails she has already given to the State Department.
Republicans were not exactly impressed.
"It's about time," said Speaker John Boehner.
"Of course, if she really cares about transparency, she would never have had a secret server in the first place," said Republican National Committee Chair Reince Priebus.
"All this means is that Hillary Clinton, in the face of FBI scrutiny, has decided she has run out of options," Priebus added.
Here was the full statement from the Clinton Campaign:
"This past spring, Hillary Clinton asked the Department of State to publish the 55,000 pages of the work emails she provided to the Department last fall. As she has said, it is her hope that State and the other agencies involved in the review process will sort out as quickly as possible which emails are appropriate to release to the public, and that the release will be as timely and transparent as possible. In the meantime, her team has worked with the State Department to ensure her emails are stored in a safe and secure manner. She directed her team to give her email server that was used during her tenure as Secretary to the Department of Justice, as well as a thumb drive containing copies of her emails already provided to the State Department. She pledged to cooperate with the Government's security inquiry, and if there are more questions, we will continue to address them.
The move by Clinton came after Congress was notified by a special Inspector General for the Intelligence Community that some Clinton emails had been judged to have contained Top Secret information.
Clinton maintains she did not know she had violated any rules, since the information was not classified at the time she sent it, during the first term of President Obama.
"Glad to see Hillary Clinton is finally handing over her email server to the FBI," said Rep. Andy Harris (R-MD).
About the Author