Left-wing pundits, activists, and entertainers attacked senior White House adviser Ivanka Trump following reports she used a personal email account to conduct government business, with some calling for her to be fired from the administration and imprisoned.
Ivanka Trump sent hundreds of emails about government business from a personal email account last year, the Washington Post reported Monday.
The emails were sent to White House aides, Cabinet members, and Ivanka Trump’s assistants, many in violation of public records rules, the paper said. The emails the group uncovered include correspondence between Ivanka Trump and Small Business Administrator Linda McMahon and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos.
As Michael McGough of the Los Angeles Times writes, there is a world of difference between the personal email use of Ivanka Trump and failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s private server usage:
I don’t want to spoil anyone’s fun, but the differences between the Clinton and Ivanka email offenses are as noteworthy as the similarities.
First of all, Clinton was the secretary of State with access to sensitive information; Ivanka Trump has a vastly less important (and more amorphous) portfolio.
More important, the Washington Post, which broke this story, noted that the FBI eventually determined that 110 of Clinton’s emails contained classified information at the time they were sent or received. A spokesman for Ivanka Trump’s lawyer said that none of her emails contained classified information. If that’s true, it’s an important difference.
The White House did not immediately respond to questions about the email use, but a spokesman for Ivanka Trump’s lawyer, Abbe Lowell, didn’t dispute the report.
“While transitioning into government… Ms. Trump sometimes used her private account, almost always for logistics and scheduling concerning her family,” said the spokesman, Peter Mirijanian.
Mirijanian stressed that no classified information was transmitted in the messages, that no emails were deleted and that the emails have since been “retained” in conformity with records laws.
“When concerns were raised in the press 14 months ago, Ms. Trump reviewed and verified her email use with White House Counsel and explained the issue to congressional leaders,” he said.
On Tuesday, President Donald Trump defended Ivanka, calling concerns of potential wrongdoing “fake news,” while drawing a distinction between his daughter’s email use and Clinton’s.
“There was no deleting like Hillary Clinton did,” the president told reporters before departing to Mar-a-lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida for Thanksgiving. “[Ivanka] wasn’t doing anything to hide her emails.”
“There was no servers in the basement, like Hillary Clinton had, you’re talking about all fake news,” he added.
Below is an assortment of activists, Hollywood celebrities and political pundits lambasting Trump over the email controversy:
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.