During a House investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private, unsecured email server during her tenure as secretary of State, Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) ripped apart FBI Director James Comey Thursday morning for publicly stating there was a lack of sufficient evidence to prosecute the presumptive Democratic nominee.
During their exchange, Comey admitted that Clinton, despite her claims of innocence, shared classified information from multiple devices and failed to turn over all of her work-related emails after she was ordered to do so.
GOWDY: Good morning, Director Comey. Secretary Clinton said she never sent or received classified information over her private e-mail. Was that true?
COMEY: Our investigation found that there was classified information sent —
GOWDY: So it was not true?
COMEY: That’s what I said.
GOWDY: OK. Well, I’m looking for a little shorter answer so you and I are not here quite as long. Secretary Clinton said there was not marked classified on her e-mails either sent or received, was that true?
COMEY: That’s not true. There were a small number of portion markings on I think three of the documents.
GOWDY: Secretary Clinton said ‘I did not e-mail any classified material to anyone on my e-mail, there is no classified material.’ Was that true?
COMEY: There was classified material e-mail.
GOWDY: Secretary Clinton said she used just one device. Was that true?
COMEY: She used multiple devices during the four years of her term as secretary of State.
GOWDY: Secretary Clinton said all work-related e-mails were returned to the State Department. Was that true?
COMEY: No. We found work-related e-mails, thousands that were not returned.
GOWDY: Secretary Clinton said neither she nor anyone else deleted work-related e-mails from her personal account. Was that true?
COMEY: That’s a harder one to answer. We found traces of work related e-mails in — on devices or slack space, whether they were deleted or whether when a server was changed out something happened to them. There’s no doubt that the work-related e-mails that were removed electronically from the — the e-mail system.
GOWDY: Secretary Clinton said her lawyers read every one of the e-mails and were overly inclusive. Did her lawyers read the e-mail content individually?
COMEY: No.
In a later exchange with Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) Comey said Clinton wasn’t sophisticated enough to understand what information was classified and what wasn’t.
“A question about sophistication came up earlier, whether she was sophisticated enough to understand what a ‘C’ means,” Comey said.
Meadows shot back: “You’re saying the former secretary of State is not sophisticated enough to understand a classified marking?”
“That’s not what I said,” Comey said. “I think it’s possible, possible, she didn’t understand what a ‘C’ meant when she saw it in the body of the e-mail like that.”
In light of the discrepancies between Clinton’s statements and the FBI’s findings, Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) said the House committee investigating her email scandal plans to ask the federal agency to investigate the statements she made to the federal agency.
Comey explained the FBI’s investigation into Clinton’s emails did not include investigating whether her testimony was truthful because the agency needs a referral from Congress to investigate.
“You’ll have one,” Chaffetz said. “You’ll have one in the next few hours.”
