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Ivanka Trump used private email for official communication in 2017: Report

ByYashwant Raj
Nov 21, 2018 12:32 AM IST

The Washington Post, which first reported these emails, said these private email account messages were discovered in a review of emails last fall of five cabinet departments in connection with a public request for official records. Ivanka switched to the official email account since.

US president’s Donald Trump’s daughter and White House adviser Ivanka Trump used a personal email account for official communications for most of 2017, according to a news report, raising the spectre of a controversy that had dogged Hillary Clinton for most of her campaign for president.

Ivanka had sent less than 100 messages from this private email account to administration officials, under 1,000 to herself and aides about her plans and schedules and also those of her family, according to a determination made by her lawyer for turning them over to the government for official record keeping.

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The Washington Post, which first reported these emails, said these private email account messages were discovered in a review of emails last fall of five cabinet departments in connection with a public request for official records. Ivanka switched to the official email account since.

But her reported defence, as conveyed through her personal attorney to the news publication, that she did not know the official rules on this, has surprised officials and observers given the ringside view she had of the 2016 campaign during which her father routinely led supporters to chant “Lock her up” calling for Clinton to be punished for her email troubles.

Peter Mirijanian, a spokesperson for Ivanka’s lawyer, said in a statement that the private account was used “almost always for logistics and scheduling concerning her family”.

“To address misinformation being peddled about Ms. Trump’s personal email, she did not create a private server in her house or office, there was never classified information transmitted, the account was never transferred or housed at Trump Organization, no emails were ever deleted, and the emails have been retained in the official account in conformity with records preservation laws and rules,” Mirijanian said in his statement.

The lawyer was drawing distinction from Clinton’s use of a private email, as secretary of state in the Obama administration, from 2009 to 2012. Clinton’s email account was hosted on a private server at the Clinton family home in New York state, it was used for transmitting and receiving some classified material and the emails were deleted when Congress began investigating it. Clinton’s aides still turned over thousands of emails to the state department that were determined by Clinton’s lawyers as official.

The controversy had dogged Clinton’s presidential campaign from the start and may have cost her what was once seen as an easy win for her. Though she had been cleared months before by the FBI, the agency had reopened the case of in view of new evidence towards the end stages of the campaign. Though she was cleared once again, the damage had been done, she and her aides have maintained since.

Using a private email can be a violation of a law that requires all White House communications be preserved and archived for every administration. Additionally, it can pose a security risk if hacked, and compromise sensitive government information.

Ivanka does not have a campaign to worry about, but her private email would be an embarrassment for her father, the president. He had not tweeted or remarked about it till late Tuesday morning. And the White House has directed reporters to Ivanka’s lawyer, who issued the statement reported above.

She and her husband Jared Kushner had set up the account ‘ijkfamily.com”, hosted on a Microsoft server, in December 2016 when they were moving to Washington DC for Kushner to join the White House staff as senior adviser to the president. Both of them continued to use it for a while and Ivanka had used it for mailing several members of the cabinet, but that was before she was appointed to join the White House staff in March, and continued to use if even after but with reduced frequency, according to The Washington Post.

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