by D. Cupples | Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald said that not all emails of the President's and Vice President's office were preserved via normal archiving processes in 2003, the time when White House staffers outed covert CIA agent Valerie Plame Wilson. Citizens for Responsiblity and Ethics in Washington suggested that between 5 and 10 million emails are missing.
It may not have much practical effect, but yesterday a federal magistrate ordered the White House to reveal whether copies of the missing emails were stored on backup tapes. The Associated Press reports:
"The order by U.S. Magistrate Judge John Facciola comes amid an effort by the White House to scuttle two lawsuits that could force the Executive Office of the President to recover any e-mail that has disappeared from computer servers where electronic documents are automatically archived.
"Two federal laws require the White House to preserve all records including e-mail.
"Facciola gave the White House five business days to report whether computer backup tapes contain e-mails written between 2003 and 2005.
"The time period covers the Valerie Plame affair in which at least three presidential aides were found to have leaked Plame's CIA identity to the news media.
"'Do the back-ups contain the e-mails said to be missing?' Facciola asked." (AP)
It's a fair question, though White House officials may not be eager to answer it. The Bush Administration has already said that courts do not have the right to review the president's record keeping under the Presidential Records Act. Whether the Administration's assertion is legally sound is open to massive debate.
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