Hillary Clinton’s email server technician is finally talking.
The Washington Post is reporting that the Department of Justice granted immunity to Bryan Pagliano in exchange for his cooperation with the FBI’s investigation into whether classified information was mishandled on Clinton’s private email server.
As one Justice Department official put it to The Post: “There was wrongdoing. But was it criminal wrongdoing?”
Pagliano may hold the key to that question. The IT director on Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign, Pagliano was hired as deputy chief information officer at the State Department in May 2009. Part of his job there was to manage Clinton’s server, which hosted her personal email address and was kept at her home in New York.
As part of Clinton’s off-the-books email system, the server held all of Clinton’s personal and work-related emails, including hundreds which contain classified information. (RELATED: Hillary’s Highly Paid IT Guru At State Department Had No National Security Experience)
The New York Times reported Wednesday that FBI investigators have already interviewed Pagliano, who in December was reported to be the focus of the agency’s probe. The paper also reported that Clinton herself could be interviewed within weeks and that the investigation could be wrapped up by May. (RELATED: Clinton’s IT Guru Said To Be Focus Of FBI In Email Probe)
Pagliano had previously refused to talk to Congress and to reporters about his work on Clinton’s server, which the FBI seized from a New Jersey data center in July.
In September, he invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination during a brief meeting with the House Select Committee on Benghazi. Other congressional committees, such as the Senate Judiciary Committee, had considered granting Pagliano immunity in exchange for information about his work for Clinton and the State Department.
Clinton’s campaign spokesman, Brian Fallon, told The Post that the campaign was “pleased” that Pagliano had decided to talk to investigators.
“As we have said since last summer, Secretary Clinton has been cooperating with the Department of Justice’s security inquiry, including offering in August to meet with them to assist their efforts if needed,” he added.
The thrust of the investigation — and the granting of immunity to Pagliano — suggests, however, that FBI is conducting much more than a mere “security inquiry.”
As The Times reported, as part of their investigation, FBI agents have attempted to compare electronic timestamps on classified documents in order to determine if Clinton’s aides took the information and retyped it into an unclassified setting.
Clinton’s server contained more than 2,000 classified emails. Of those, 22 have been deemed to have contained “top secret” information. Dozens more contain “secret” information. The intelligence community’s inspector general has also determined that information in one of the “top secret” emails was classified when it was originated. The State Department is still investigating whether the information on the other “top secret” emails was classified when they were sent.