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 Clinton tried to cool the brewing firestorm late on Wednesday,
saying she wanted the State Department to release the emails
quickly. But a senior State Department official told Reuters on
Thursday the task would take time.
"The review is likely to take several months given the sheer volume
of the document set," the official said.
At the same time, the department is investigating whether Clinton
violated policies intended to protect sensitive information when she
conducted all of her official business through a personal account
while serving as secretary from 2009 to 2013, the Washington Post
reported on Thursday, citing a senior department official.
Using personal email did not automatically break rules, but the
department is determining whether work emails sent from that private
account contained information that must be handled on a system
meeting specific security protocols, the Washington Post reported.
 The State Department has said there was no prohibition during
Clinton's tenure on using personal email for official business as
long as it was preserved. It had no immediate comment on the
Washington Post report.
Fox News on Thursday released a State Department cable sent from the
secretary's office in 2011 reviewing some email policies that
encouraged employees to avoid conducting official business from
personal accounts.
An extended review or investigation could dash any Clinton hopes of
putting the controversy to rest quickly.
"I want the public to see my email," Clinton said in a tweet. "I
asked State to release them. They said they will review them for
release as soon as possible."
The controversy landed Clinton in trouble just as she prepares to
enter the race for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016.
It has prompted some Democrats to wonder whether someone else should
be their candidate in the bid to succeed President Barack Obama.
A total of 55,000 pages of documents covering the time Clinton was
in office has been turned over, according to the State Department.
But Clinton and her aides controlled that process, and the emails
were not archived on government servers.
Secretary of State John Kerry told reporters during a visit to Saudi
Arabia that the State Department would review the documents "as
rapidly as possible."
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Clinton's tweeted statement came hours after a congressional
committee investigating the Sept. 11, 2012, attack on a U.S.
diplomatic facility in Benghazi, Libya, subpoenaed her emails.
The U.S. House of Representatives Select Committee on Benghazi
demanded all Clinton communications related to the incident and told
Internet companies to protect relevant documents.
The panel's Republican chairman, Representative Trey Gowdy of South
Carolina, told reporters he wanted the documents within two weeks or
a "really good explanation" for why not.
Republicans have scrutinized Clinton's actions regarding the
Benghazi attack in which Ambassador Chris Stevens and three others
were killed and have also criticized Clinton's transparency and
ethics. The former first lady and U.S. senator has been a lightning
rod for Republican detractors dating back to the administration of
her husband, former President Bill Clinton.
Clinton is the presumptive favorite for the 2016 Democratic
presidential nomination, and there was no sign the controversy was
forcing a change of plans. A Democratic source familiar with
campaign planning said to expect a Clinton announcement on her
intentions in the spring.
The Republican National Committee's top lawyer on Thursday asked the
State Department's inspector general to investigate if Clinton's
email use violated federal law.
(Additional reporting by Susan Cornwell, Amanda Becker, Lisa Lambert
and Peter Cooney; Writing by John Whitesides; Editing by Leslie
Adler and Lisa Shumaker)
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