EDITORIALS

Editorial: Release Clinton emails

We urge the State Department to release the remaining documents as quickly as possible — before voters go the polls to elect a new president this fall — so that voters have all the facts.

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Hillary Clinton’s email problems aren’t going away anytime soon — certainly not before the November election and certainly not after the news Monday that the FBI had collected about 15,000 new emails during its investigation of her. A federal judge ordered the State Department to expedite release of those documents.

Also on Monday, a conservative group investigating Clinton released 725 pages of documents that showed a very close relationship between the Clinton Foundation and the State Department despite Clinton's pledge to erect a firewall between them. There did not appear to be any evidence that access to Clinton resulted in “favors,” as the group alleged. But the coziness is troubling.

We urge the State Department to release all remaining documents as quickly as possible — before the presidential election this fall — so that voters have all the facts.

The new revelations from the conservative group Judicial Watch don’t appear to show examples of foundation donors getting something from the State Department after gaining access through the foundation. But they do illustrate a worrisome blurring of lines.

“These emails show that there was a long line of Clinton Foundation friends who had no qualms about asking the Clinton State Department for meetings, favors, and special treatment,” Scott Amey, general counsel at the Project on Government Oversight, told USA Today. “Not shocking, but it is disappointing that there were such blurred lines between State Department officials and outsiders.”

Many of the emails involved exchanges between top Clinton aide Huma Abedin and Douglas Band, an executive with the foundation. In one, Band ran interference for the crown prince of Bahrain whose family had donated millions of dollars to the foundation. 

“Good friend of ours,” Band wrote. An appointment with Clinton and the prince later was arranged through the State Department.

In another case, S. Daniel Abraham, an executive with SlimFast and a major donor to the foundation, scored a 2009 meeting with Clinton, USA Today reports. Abraham was the head of the Center for Middle East Peace at the time, the Clinton campaign noted.

In yet another case, Abedin was wary when Band sought her help for a member of the Wolverhampton Football Club who was facing a criminal charge. Band was trying to do a favor for another big foundation donor, Casey Wasserman, who is a sports marketing executive in California. According to the Clinton campaign, no action was taken on the request.

The exchanges disclosed by Judicial Watch show an uncomfortable coziness between the State Department and the Clinton Foundation. The foundation appears to have been an open door through which well-heeled donors could walk to gain access to Clinton. The campaign denies it's a problem.

“No matter how this group tries to mischaracterize these documents, the fact remains that Hillary Clinton never took action as Secretary of State because of donations to the Clinton Foundation,” Clinton spokesman Josh Schwerin said.

Maybe not. But Republicans are right to call for the latest trove of emails to be released quickly so voters can decide for themselves.