I think White House pressers Scott Stanzel can do a little better on telling us why the White House changed their email retention policy for RNC emails back in 2004. Some pretty canny reporter asked this question this morning in the gaggle …
Reporter: On the change in policy in ’04, wasn’t that in response to Patrick Fitzgerald’s investigation into the White House and the need, in response to his inquiries, to preserve records?
Stanzel: I don’t know the reasons for that change. That’s our understanding of when that change occurred. But the White House Counsel’s Office is working with the RNC counsel to be sure and to gather more information about when changes were made and why they were made….
I can say that I am very confident, very confident that that reporter is correct and that orders from Pat Fitzgerald were the reason for the change in White House policy in 2004. So the change in policy was tied to yet another criminal investigation of the White House. And the White House and the key employees in question — namely Karl Rove and people working for him at the White House political office — were specifically on notice not to destroy the emails they sent through the RNC servers. And yet they took affirmative steps to continue destroying them, even after all of this had happened.
