BOOM -
David Nir writes about the NYT's dramatic walkback of its claim that two government Inspector Generals had made a referral to the Justice Department seeking a criminal inquiry of Hillary Clinton regarding her e-mails.
But the story gets worse for the New York Times. These memos (PDF) from OIG regarding the very same investigation demonstrate that in fact the issue is about how the State Department handled Clinton's e-mails AFTER she turned them over to State:
UNCLASSIFIED June 29, 2015
MEMORANDUM FOR UNDER SECRETARY KENNEDY
FROM: Steve A Linick, Inspector General, Department of State
I. Charles McCullough, ill, Inspector General, Intelligence Community
SUBJECT: Potential Issues Identified by the Office of the Inspector General of the
Intelligence Community Concerning the Department of State's Process for the
Review of Former Secretary Clinton's Emails under the Freedom of Information
Act (ESP-15-05) [My emphasis]
The OIG is looking at "the Department of State's Process for the Review of Former Secretary Clinton's Emails under the Freedom of Information Act." Guess who has nothing to do with that? If you said Hillary, Clinton, you win a gold star.
Want more? How about this?
We are therefore providing this Memorandum as follow up to our June 19, 2015, Memorandum to you, to provide additional information supporting our concerns about the current process underway to review the 55,000 pages of emails prior to publication.
Again, you want to guess who's not involved with this process? Yep, Hillary Clinton.
Finally, how about this?
Under the circumstances, we continue to urge the Department to adopt the recommendations made by the IC IG in our June 19 Memorandum in order to enhance the current review system and to further minimize risk. The Department should ensure that no classified documents are publically released.
The IG concerns is about TOO much release of information. Not too little. And again you know who has no role in that? Yes, the answer remains Hillary Clinton.
UPDATE - Elijah Cummings states flatly NYT story is false:
I spoke personally to the State Department Inspector General on Thursday, and he said he never asked the Justice Department to launch a criminal investigation of Secretary Clinton's email usage,” Cummings, the top Democrat on the House Select Committee on Benghazi, said Friday in a statement.
Instead, Steve Linick, State’s Inspector General “told me the Intelligence Community IG notified the Justice Department and Congress that they identified classified information in a few emails that were part of the [Freedom of Information Act] review, and that none of those emails had been previously marked as classified."