Colin Powell has accused Hillary Clinton of using him as a scapegoat for her use of a private email server as secretary of state.
A New York Times report out last week cited an alleged 2009 dinner conversation between Clinton and Powell, who served as secretary of state under George W. Bush, in which Powell advised Clinton to use a private email account. Clinton relayed this exchange to FBI officials during a July interview that resulted in director James Comey’s decision not to pursue criminal charges against her.
“The truth is she was using it for a year before I sent her a memo telling her what I did,” Powell told the New York Post on Sunday. “Her people have been trying to pin it on me.”
Powell released a statement on Thursday saying he had no recollection of that conversation, which was first reported by journalist Joe Conason in his forthcoming book “Man of the World: The Further Endeavors of Bill Clinton.”
A 2009 email exchange that emerged during the F.B.I.’s investigation of Clinton’s email use found that Powell urged Clinton to use a personal email account for unclassified messages.
Key differences existed in the former secretary of states’ email practices, however. Clinton exclusively used a private email account for all state Department business and had a private server located at her house. Like Clinton, Both Powell and former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice received classified information on their personal emails while in office, according to a 2015 review conducted by the State Department inspector general.
Correction: The original post incorrectly stated that Powell used his personal AOL account for personal communications only. In fact, as has been previously reported, Powell used the AOL account to conduct State Department business, and the department’s inspector general issued a report earlier this year that some of the information in those emails was later deemed classified.
