Hillary Clinton’s private emails became the subject of a journalistic treasure hunt this week, as reporters scoured the 7,000 pages of records published by the State Department Monday to find the juiciest bits of internal discussion.
Although the former secretary of state deleted roughly half of her emails before handing over records to the government last year, the publicly available tranche sheds light on how she and her top aides operated as they oversaw the nation’s diplomacy.
Here are 12 new facts we learned from the latest batch of Clinton emails
1. Clinton is serious about her gefilte fish.
In a rapid-fire email to several of her aides in March 2010, Clinton demanded to know where her staff stood on gefilte fish – which is, according to the dictionary, “a dish of stewed or baked stuffed fish, or of fish cakes boiled in a fish or vegetable broth and usually served chilled.” It is reportedly a traditional Jewish meal.
Earlier emails indicate the message was not an expression of Clinton’s affection for the dish, however, but an inquiry into a customs dust-up that was preventing American shipments of carp from leaving a port in Israel.
2. Huma Abedin doesn’t get paid enough.
Huma Abedin, Clinton’s deputy chief of staff, is presently the subject of multiple investigations and Freedom of Information Act lawsuits seeking to find out how she was able to collect paychecks from the State Department, the Clinton Foundation and a consulting firm called Teneo simultaneously.
But the busy aide apparently felt her three salaries were not adequate compensation, as a fellow official quipped in a Dec. 2010 email, “to quote Huma, I don’t get paid enough.” Abedin reportedly earned nearly $500,000 a year.
3. Clinton thinks classification is a joke.
Clinton demanded one of her top aides, Jake Sullivan, remove statements from former British Prime Minister Tony Blair off the classified server on which they were hosted and paste them into an email. “Just email it,” she told Sullivan in February 2010. After he complied, Clinton joked sarcastically that Blair’s statements were “certainly worthy of being top secret.”
4. The State Dept. IT desk didn’t know about Clinton’s private emails.
Abedin informed Clinton in February 2010 that the agency’s technology help desk was trying to figure out why emails were bouncing back from Clinton’s account. “They had no idea it was YOU, just some random address so they emailed,” Abedin explained, noting the IT analysts had assumed Clinton used an official “state.gov” account.
5. Clinton doesn’t quite remember her Senate voting record.
Clinton pressed an aide to comb through her voting record from her time as a U.S. senator from New York in December 2010, as Republicans and Democrats sparred over whether to raise the debt ceiling.
“Can you pls tell me how many times I voted against raising the debt limit?” she asked, apparently unaware of her own position.
As it turns out, Clinton had voted against raising the debt ceiling four times, although her own party had excoriated Republicans for refusing to increase the limit unless it was accompanied by spending cuts.
6. Clinton insiders think House Speaker Boehner is a drunk.
Sidney Blumenthal, Clinton’s controversial informal adviser, called Speaker of the House John Boehner “louche, alcoholic, lazy, and without any commitment to any principle” in an email blasting the Republican leader for his “hollow” leadership.
Blumenthal accused Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of being “relatively in the same position in the Senate.” Clinton later thanked her longtime friend for his insights into the congressional leaders.
7. They also wanted to impeach Justice Clarence Thomas.
David Brock, founder of Clinton-aligned group Media Matters, and Blumenthal sent Clinton a memo detailing a plan to impeach conservative Justice Clarence Thomas from the Supreme Court. They dug up inconsistencies in the story of Thomas’ former assistant, who testified in 1991 that the justice sexually harassed her.
8. Clinton is not a fan of “ogrish males.”
Philippe Reines, Clinton’s longtime spokesman, thanked her in May 2010 for “finally call[ing] out the ogrish males on your staff who roll their eyes at womens issues and events.” Clinton has long styled herself a champion of women’s rights. “They just don’t get it,” Reines lamented of her staff.
9. Cheryl Mills is glad Clinton was born.
Cheryl Mills, Clinton’s chief of staff, lavished birthday praise on the secretary in 2010, referring to Clinton as “my dear.”
“So glad you were born!” Mills wrote. “Kiss your mom for me — she did us right bringing you into the world.”
10. Clinton tried to get a $600,000 donation out of Norway.
While Clinton had pledged to stay far away from the Clinton Foundation while serving as secretary of state, one email suggests she made a personal plea to the government of Norway to donate $600,000 to a foundation project.
She and her aides plan to unveil the contribution at a Clinton Global Initiative event. Norway has been a substantial contributor to the Clinton Foundation in the past.
11. She also tried to help her CEO friends snag some visas.
As Clinton attempted to drum up donations for a political pet project at State, she approached her staff with requests from the CEOs of Honeywell and the Blackstone Group, two companies that ultimately became sponsors of the project.
Clinton asked for a visa for the CEO of Blackstone and relayed complaints about too-tight export controls from the CEO of Honeywell, demanding an aide look into the problems on behalf of her corporate friends.
12. The WikiLeaks breach really got under Clinton’s skin.
Mark Penn, former pollster for Clinton and head of a major public relations firm, emailed Clinton in November 2010 to unload about the publication of more than 250,000 leaked diplomatic cables online.
“No State department can operate if it can’t keep its own classified cables and internal orders confidential — I think this is unprecedented in history,” Penn wrote. “And if this is wikileaks can get, what can the Chinese or other able to secure?”
Emails indicate Clinton and her staff were deeply concerned about the global effects of the leak.
Critics have wondered if Clinton’s decision to use a private email account and server exposed her communications to foreign governments such as the Chinese, given its apparent lack of digital security.
What’s more, Clinton’s arrangement potentially compromised intelligence that was classified as high as “top secret,” while the WikiLeaks breach involved documents that were classified as “confidential,” a much lower level.
