Former United States first lady and secretary of state Hillary Clinton has asked the State Department to release emails she sent using her personal email address instead of the official one given to her by the U.S. government.
Clinton posted on her official Twitter account on March 4, Wednesday night, "I want the public to see my email. I asked State to release them. They said they will review them for release as soon as possible."
The former first lady is facing serious criticism for violating protocol, especially in using the official email address given to her office as the Secretary of State instead of her private email. Several sectors are questioning her compliance with existing government rules, reported CNN.
The fact that Clinton is being considered as a serious frontrunner in the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination and hopefully another shot for the Clinton to reside again in the White House, makes the issue more important. To be fair, Hillary has not yet announced her intention to seek election in 2016.
To be clear, Hillary is not the first secretary of state to use her private email address during their tenure. Former Secretaries Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice also maintained their private emails but Clinton is the first to use her private email exclusively on official communication. Powell and Rice used their authorized email addresses.
A spokesman for the State Department Spokesman Nick Merrill, denied allegations that the former secretary of state violated any federal record-keeping laws. Clinton's staff defended her use of private emails, said The Guardian.
Merrill insisted that Clinton followed with the "letter and spirit" of the Federal Records Act, saying that her office reviewed tens of thousands of pages from her personal emails to the State Department before handing over more than 55,000 pages of emails when she left office.
White House press secretary, Josh Earnest, said Clinton is allowed to use her private email for official business if she turned them over to the State Department for archiving.
Earnest was quoted as saying, "What I can tell you is that very specific guidance has been given to agencies all across the government, which is specifically that employees of the Obama administration should use their official email accounts when they're conducting official government business."