美国国家公共电台 NPR White House Aides Used Private Email For Official Business: 'Just Very, Very Stupid'

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The House Oversight 1 Committee is asking the White House for a list of aides who've used private email accounts for official business. This request comes after confirmation 2 that President Trump 3's son-in-law and top adviser 4, Jared Kushner, used a personal account for at least some White House business. NPR White House correspondent Tamara Keith has this look at what the rules are for these kinds of communications.

TAMARA KEITH, BYLINE 5: The Presidential Records Act has, since 1978, made it plain that the president and his advisers 6 need to preserve all presidential records.

NATE JONES: Essentially 7, the law on the books since the Nixon administration says that the public needs to know the official business of the federal government.

KEITH: Nate Jones is with the National Security Archive, an open government group. Presidential records include emails and text messages. In 2014, Jones says the law was updated.

JONES: To make it crystal clear that you couldn't use personal or any other email and that if you did, for example, for convenience, or if the email was broken, or the occasions that we all know in real life - if you did, you had to forward it to the official account within 20 days.

KEITH: This was all prompted by something that happened during the George W. Bush administration. Richard Painter was chief White House ethics 8 lawyer at the time and instructed all aides and officials that they shouldn't use non-government emails for official business.

RICHARD PAINTER: But a number of people chose to use Republican National Committee email for official United States government business. And then the Republican National Committee's server apparently 9 deleted it.

KEITH: Millions of emails went missing, though they were recovered much later. Painter says there are two main reasons why using personal email for official business is problematic - for records preservation 10 and because of the risk that classified information could end up on nongovernment systems. But Painter says it seems to keep happening.

PAINTER: You know, it was embarrassing. And I would have hoped that Secretary Clinton would've learned from that. Apparently, she didn't. And I would hope that the Trump administration would've learn from what has happened before, as well. And, apparently, they don't learn the lesson, either.

KEITH: Jared Kushner, the president's son-in-law and adviser, sent or received about a hundred work-related emails on his personal account from January through August - usually forwarded articles or an exchange initiated 11 by someone else. That is according to a statement from his attorney, Abbe Lowell. Lowell added, quote, "all nonpersonal emails were forwarded to his official address, and all have been preserved in any event." But that passive voice - were forwarded - catches Jones's ear.

JONES: The key thing that Mr. Kushner's lawyer didn't say was if he forwarded the emails before 20 days were over or not because, if he did, he would be in the clear. But if he forwarded his emails to the official account after, he did break the law.

KEITH: Kushner's lawyer did not respond to questions about when Kushner forwarded the emails. to his official account. But here's the thing. Even if Kushner did violate the Presidential Records Act, there aren't many consequences - possible disciplinary action.

PAINTER: It's not a criminal offense 12. It's just very, very stupid.

KEITH: Again, Richard Painter.

PAINTER: None of this is criminal. Nobody's getting locked up. But it really is very, very poor judgment 13.

KEITH: Reports in Politico and The New York Times indicate Kushner is not the only senior Trump White House aide, past or present, to use a personal account. The House Oversight Committee has set an October 9 deadline for the White House to respond to its request for information about who has been using personal email for government business. Tamara Keith, NPR News, Washington.