[VIDEO] Hillary Clinton to turn over private email server to Justice Department

Washington (CNN)Hillary Clinton agreed to turn over her private email server to authorities on Tuesday, the same day an intelligence community inspector general told congressional committees that at least five emails from the server did contain classified information.

The decision to hand over the server, as well as a thumb drive of all her work-related emails to the Justice Department, represents an effort to blunt an expanding probe into her use of a private email account.

Clinton, now the Democratic presidential front-runner, "directed her team to give her email server that was used during her tenure as (secretary of state) to the Department of Justice, as well as a thumb drive containing copies of her emails already provided to the State Department," her spokesman, Nick Merrill, told CNN early Tuesday evening. "She pledged to cooperate with the government's security inquiry, and if there are more questions, we will continue to address them."

Merrill said in the meantime, Clinton's team "has worked with the State Department to ensure her emails are stored in a safe and secure manner."

The FBI, which is handling the matter, declined to comment Tuesday evening. David E. Kendall, Clinton's lawyer, did not immediately return messages seeking comment.

A senior Clinton campaign aide said the server hadn't yet changed hands as of Tuesday evening and Clinton's team is working with the Justice Department to arrange the logistics of the handover. The thumb drive, meanwhile, has been turned over. And Kendall, the aide said, has followed State Department guidance on safekeeping.

Clinton's campaign believes there are no emails from her State Department tenure on the server, since it was wiped clean after she turned over her work-related emails to the State Department, the aide said.

The aide said it's the Clinton campaign's understanding that the Justice Department isn't looking to reconstruct the server's history, but is instead concerned about the security of the emails today, since some are now classified, though they weren't classified or labeled as such at the time.

Clinton certifies she has turned over work-related emails

Boehner: 'It's about time'

For Clinton, the move -- which Republicans like House Speaker John Boehner have urged for months -- indicates her campaign sees a growing risk in the issue of her use of a private email server, which has stoked concerns about her trustworthiness.

"It's about time," Boehner said in a statement Tuesday night.

Since news broke in March of her use of a personal email address on a server kept in her Chappaqua, New York, home, Clinton has insisted that she's turned over all of her work-related emails to the State Department and deleted all others -- but wouldn't turn over her server to the government.

Clinton has been dogged by poll numbers showing that more Americans, by a margin of about 20 percentage points, say she's not trustworthy rather than trustworthy. A late July CNN/ORC poll found that 58% of all registered voters say it is extremely important that the next president be honest and trustworthy.

Rep. Trey Gowdy, who chairs the House Select Committee on Benghazi and has pushed for Clinton's emails for months, claimed credit for her decision to turn over the server.

"The revelation that Secretary Clinton exclusively used private email for official public business, and the multitude of issues that emanated from her decision, including this most recent one, demonstrates what can happen when Congress and those equally committed to exposing the truth, doggedly pursue facts and follow them," he said in a statement.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said Clinton waited "a long time" 

Via: CNN Politics

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Katie Pavlich: Obama’s anti-police ideology

As President Obama starts to wind down his tenure in the White House, with just a year and a half to go, he’s focusing on federalization of local police forces in the name of “justice.” Attorney General Loretta Lynch will be his go-to on this project, just as Eric Holder was before her. 

The goal, according to the White House and Department of Justice, is to take a close look at police practices across the country to ensure minorities, in particular African-Americans, aren’t unfairly singled out for police scrutiny. 

But Obama’s long record shows he isn’t necessarily interested in police brutality; instead, he holds an anti-police ideology. 

It all started way back in 2009 when Obama, before he knew all of the facts, accused the police of “acting stupidly” after his friend, Harvard Professor Henry Gates, was briefly arrested for breaking into his home. 

“I don’t know, not having been there and not seeing all the facts, what role race played,” the president said at the time. “But I think it’s fair to say, No. 1, any of us would be pretty angry; No. 2, that the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home; and, No. 3 ... that there’s a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately.”

This was a look at Obama’s perspective on the police — take a glance at the White House visitor log, the president’s consultants and the people he nominates, and you’ll get a clear picture of how anti-police he really is. 

So-called civil rights activist and race-baiter the Rev. Al Sharpton has been to the White House nearly 100 times since 2009 and regularly provides consultation on race issues to the president. Obama and Holder went out of their way to participate in events for Sharpton’s National Action Network and proudly displayed his logo behind them during speeches. 

“You know, actions speak louder than words. You put Al Sharpton next to you, you just told everyone, ‘I’m against the police,’ ” former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani said recently. He’s right. 

The president’s stoking of racial flames in Ferguson, Mo., and Baltimore, actions also taken by Sharpton, further proves this point. 

Via: The Hill

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Pennsylvania Ripe for the Picking

Pennsylvania is approaching the Nov. 6 presidential election with 3 percent fewer registered voters than in fall 2008, an unusual slip that political analysts blame on a drop in voter enthusiasm across the country.

Democrats especially experienced a slump, bleeding 229,396 registered voters in Pennsylvania since the last presidential race, state data show. Republicans are down 112,796 registrants, but voters unconnected to either major party grew by 7 percent, or 73,043, according to Pennsylvania Department of State figures. As of Monday the state had 8,487,093 voters, down from 8,755,588 in November 2008, despite a 2 percent population gain. Democrats still hold a 50-37 percentage registration edge over Republicans, down one point from 2008.

The registration deadline for the election was Oct. 9.

“This year, we don’t have such a sense that this election is going to make history the way we did in 2008,” said Pat Dunham, chairwoman of the political science department at Duquesne University. “Enthusiasm in general may have dampened a little. Three-and-a-half years after electing Barack Obama, we see it’s not that easy to change things. ”

For Democrats in particular, “there’s not the same excitement” as four years ago, when the party tallied thousands of registrations, said political analyst Geoffrey Skelley of the University of Virginia Center for Politics.

“There are probably no states that have had incredible increases in voter registration” this time, Skelley said.

Swing states that are losing that status may experience declines in voter registration when candidate visits and advertising shift to areas more in play, political scientists said.

Pennsylvania, which typically votes Democrat for presidents, joined Michigan, Indiana and Missouri to become less of a swing state, said Keystone College professor Jeff Brauer.

Via: Trib Live

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Senator Sessions: Administration Ignoring Laws That Prohibit Visas For ‘Likely’ Welfare Recipients

 The Obama administration is waiving a law that requires it to deny visas and entry to non-citizens who are “likely at any time to become” a government dependent – and is ignoring requests for information regarding this move, Sen. Jeff Sessions said today.

Sen. Sessions (R-AL), Ranking Member of the Senate Budget Committee, issued a statement after USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack missed the deadline to reply to oversight requests for data on expenditures for non-citizens on food stamps and information regarding the administration’s waiver of federal immigration law:

“Included in the oversight letter was a request for information about USDA’s contact with the Departments of State and Homeland Security regarding immigration law. Both DHS and DOS have effectively nullified the federal law that prohibits admission into the U.S. for those likely to become welfare reliant, further enabling USDA to surge non-citizen registration.”

“Such activities cannot be justified to the American people, which probably explains why the Administration has been unwilling to provide answers,” Sen. Sessions said.

According to section 212 of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which defines “Classes of aliens ineligible for visas or admission”:

“Any alien who, in the opinion of the consular officer at the time of application for a visa, or in the opinion of the Attorney General at the time of application for admission or adjustment of status, is likely at any time to become a public charge is inadmissible.”

Via: CNS News

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