Global Research

One of the major email “leak” stories to emerge last week courtesy of the WSJ, was that the White House had intervened on at least one occasion to suppress the story surrounding Hillary’s “Secret Server” scandal, through backdoor channels with the State Department. This is what we noted as per the original piece:

Ten days after the story broke, White House communications director Jennifer Palmieri emailed State Department spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki to ask, “between us on the shows…think we can get this done so he is not asked about email.” That apparently referred to Mr. Kerry, who appeared in an interview on CBS ’s “Face the Nation” three days later.

“Agree completely and working to crush on my end,” wrote back Ms. Psaki.

A day later, Ms. Psaki added, “Good to go on killing CBS idea.” She continued, “And we are going to hold on any other TV options just given the swirl of crap out there.” Mr. Kerry wasn’t asked on CBS about the email server, though it isn’t clear how Ms. Psaki could have guaranteed that.

Teased by Ms. Palmieri about her use of the phrase “swirl of crap,” Ms. Psaki wrote back: “Ha I mean—the challenging stories out there.”

While we are confident there were many other interactions between the White House and the State Department meant to boost the winning odds of the Clinton presidential campaign, this was sufficient evidence to confirm that on at least one occasion, the two entities had colluded.

Now, courtesy of the latest leak by Wikileaks, which earlier today released another 2,000 emails by Clinton campaign chairman, John Podesta, we may have stumbled on evidence of collusion between the State Department and the Clinton Campaign itself. In an email from close Hillary’s confidant Heather Samuelson, also known as “the Clinton insider who screened Hillary’s emails“, we learn the intimate details leaked by Samuelson regarding a FOIA request submitted previously by Judicial Watch regarding Bill Clinton speeches, which shows that virtually entire process was being “translated” over to Hillary’s campaign.

By way of reminder, here is a quick Politico primer on who Heather Samuelson is, from September 2015:

Hillary Clinton chose a former campaign staffer who followed her to the State Department to make the initial determination about which of her emails should be preserved as federal records, according to closed-door testimony by Clinton’s former chief of staff Cheryl Mills, a GOP source told POLITICO.

Heather Samuelson, a lawyer and 2008 Clinton campaign staffer, worked under Mills and Clinton’s attorney David Kendall to sift through her ex-boss’ messages. She helped separate those that were purely personal, which were not turned over to the State Department, from those that were work-related.

THe Daily Caller adds the following:

A longtime Clinton campaign staffer who worked for as White House liaison at Clinton’s State Department and, later, as her lawyer.

As a lawyer, Samuelson led up the 2014 review of Clinton’s emails to determine which ones were work-related and which were personal.

Most importantly, as we reported previously, Samuelson received DOJ immunity in exchange for turning over the laptop she used during the review of Clinton’s emails in 2014. 

Finally, as the NRO wrote over the weekend, “The more information that drips out about the Clinton e-mail investigation, the more we learn that two key subjects, Hillary confidants Cheryl Mills and Heather Samuelson, got extraordinarily special treatment — concessions that would never be given to subjects in a normal investigation. The primary reason for this is that the Obama Justice Department was never going to charge Hillary Clinton and her accomplices with crimes.

The guise under which Mills and Samuelson got the kid-glove treatment was their status as lawyers. Crucially, this status was the Justice Department’s pretext for resolving that potentially incriminating evidence against them, and against their “client,” Mrs. Clinton, had to be shielded from investigators pursuant to the attorney-client privilege.

Except neither Mills nor Samuelson was eligible to represent Clinton in matters related to the e-mails, including the FBI’s criminal investigation. Moreover, even if they had arguably been eligible, attorney-client communications in furtherance of criminal schemes are not privileged.

* * *

Mills and Samuelson were given immunity in exchange for surrendering their laptops not because searching lawyers’ computers is complicated, but because the Justice Department had no intention of prosecuting them. That is also why Justice severely limited the FBI’s search of the laptops, just as it severely limited the FBI’s questioning of Mills. Mills and Samuelson were given immunity because Justice did not want to commence a grand-jury investigation, which would have empowered investigators to compel production of the laptops by simply issuing subpoenas. Justice did not want to use the grand jury because doing so would have signaled that the case was headed toward indictment. The Obama Justice Department was never going to indict Hillary Clinton, and was determined not to damage her presidential campaign by taking steps suggestive of a possible indictment.

Today, we may have stumbled on the real reason why Samuelson got immunity.

In the following email dated March 17, 2015 disclosed today by Wikileaks, we find troubling details of the internal State Department process, which somehow made its way to Samlueson with details so nuanced it may only have come as a result of direct communication between the State Department (or DOS as Samuelson calls it) as Hillary’s young confidant, and which in turn she promptly conveyed to her team, regarding the FOIA request, in what appears to be a material breach of confidentiality. This is what she said :

DOS is soon releasing another round of documents and email traffic (not hers) in response to Judicial Watch’s FOIA request on DOS’s process for reviewing WJC’s speaking engagements.

It’s 116 pages with approx. 50 sponsor/subsponsor requests. No objections by DOS in this batch, but some lengthy internal discussions among DOS officials that I highlighted below.

There is one request where speaking fee would have been paid by Turkish govt — WJC’s office declined this.   And one speaking engagement with fee from Canadian government, which he did do.

Let me know if you have any questions.

We have one question, Heather: is this legal, and are emailed exchanges such as this one why you received DOJ immunity in exchange for “turning over your laptop”?

From the original email, bolding ours.

* * *

From: Heather Samuelson [mailto:[email protected]]

Sent: Tuesday, March 17, 2015 10:53 AM
To: Maura Pally; Craig Minassian; Philippe Reines; Nick Merrill; Jennifer Palmier I
Cc: Cheryl Mills; Tina Flournoy
Subject: JW FOIA | WJC Speeches

All —  DOS is soon releasing another round of documents and email traffic (not hers) in response to Judicial Watch’s FOIA request on DOS’s process for reviewing WJC’s speaking engagements.   

It’s 116 pages with approx. 50 sponsor/subsponsor requests.   No objections by DOS in this batch, but some lengthy internal discussions among DOS officials that I highlighted below.  

There is one request where speaking fee would have been paid by Turkish govt — WJC’s office declined this.   And one speaking engagement with fee from Canadian government, which he did do.  

Let me know if you have any questions.

[Jen — happy to give you more background on prior releases since it’s your first go around]

Thx

1) UNIQFEST/Turkey:  There are 20 pages of internal, heavily redacted email traffic among DOS officials on request for WJC to speak at UNIQFEST in 2009 — a climate change conference sponsored by the Turkish government with Turkish officials as featured speakers.  According to the traffic, WJC would receive compensation from “government and non-government sources.”

— WJC’s office decided to decline the invitation.  There is no final determination in the materials by the Department.

—  Some of email traffic has subject line  “Clinton Foundation” and refers to this as request from “Clinton Foundation.”  I only flag as may be twisted to say DOS did not even understand what they were reviewing for, blurred lines between personal and BHCCF etc…

2)   Canadian National Exhibition:  Email traffic indicates WJC’s compensation for this speaking engagement would come from the Canadian government via their program to promote tourism, “Industry Canada.”  There is heavily redacted email traffic between DOS officials, including our Embassy in Canada, with several emails from WJC’s office asking for status update, at one point saying they only have “about more 30 minutes before we lose the offer.”

— Jim Thessin (Deputy Legal Advisor) responds: “I do not have a problem with this so long as President Clinton is not serving as a U.S. government at the time of his appearance and when he is paid an honorarium.   If not an employee, he may accept reimbursements of expenses and an honorarium for his speech/talk, but he may not receive any gifts from the Canadian government.”

— HRC’s financial disclosure form indicates that WJC received $175,000 from Canadian National Exhibition for this speech on 8/29/09.

3)  CISCO:  Request is submitted for WJC to speak at CISCO two months before HRC awards CISCO the State Department’s Award for Corporate Excellence, holding a ceremony featuring the CISCO’s CEO.    According to HRC’s financial disclosure form, WJC received $255,000 for this speech.

4)  Other notable requests:  

1. Local foreign govt:  Terife Island Council (local government of largest island in Canary Islands)
2. Private Equity Firms/Banks:   ICE Canyon LLC, VISTA Equity, Harris Private Bank, TD Bank Financial, Whitton Investment Groups (London)
3. Foreign Based Organizations:  Etisalat (UAE based telecomm co); Egyptian Junior Business Association; Friends of Cystic Fibrosis (Irish non-profit); Essex Regional Conservation Authority (Essex, Ontario); Wilbros Entertainment (Philippines, event to raise funds for Philippines charity); Miaor Entertainment Ltd (division of Grupo ABC based in Brazil); London Business Forum; Aditya Birla Management (Indian multinational conglomerate)
4. Universities:  Southern Methodist, Tufts, American Jewish University

5)  GWB:   Two requests are for events with Deloitte and Radio City Music Hall that are a joint appearance between WJC and George W. Bush.  WJC did the event with Deloitte, but not Radio City.

In light of the ongoing speculation that there may have been collusion between the DOJ and Bill Clinton (and thus Hillary), following the infamous “tarmac encounter”, where Bill and Loretta Lynch spoke for 40 minutes about “Bill’s gold game and grandchildren”, the discovery that there was collusion between the State Department and Hillary Clinton, who formerly headed it, seems like a potential conflict of interest to us.