[jc4p]

I tried updating my post but because this post was flagged away it seems to have duplicated somewhere else: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12037507 -- This article explains it a bit, it's also light on the details. If you read the Judicial Watch testimony of her staffers, a lot of them touch on this.

[projectramo]

okay, well, if this bears out what you said, I'll stop using this argument.

p.s. what article?

[jc4p]

Bah did the link in my comment not work? I tried updating my original comment to link to http://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/state-department-email... but now there's two versions of my comment, one pre-edit in this chain and one post-edit in another chain I can't find. This article is heavily biased, I think, but it mentions the post Powell rulings. In the Judicial Watch testimony of Cheryl Mills she mentioned the post Powell decisions.

[projectramo]

Ah, but here is an important distinction too.

The State Department can't pass laws for which you can be jailed. It can only pass internal rules which it can use to fire you etc. It also cannot produce interpretations or clarifications of laws since only judges do that.

Only congress can pass laws, and so illegal is a strong term reserved for violations of those laws.

There is a case for violating those laws, of course, which is whatever the relevant statutes are for handling secret information under which spies etc are prosecuted.

So while these are internal rules she may have violated, they are not the same as laws, and those laws apply equally to her predecessors, and therefore I feel justified in continuing to make the argument.