US

DOJ Official Tipped Podesta On Clinton Email Release, Shopped His Son For Campaign Job

Virginia Kruta Associate Editor
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Former Assistant Attorney General Peter Kadzik tried to get his son a job with the Hillary Clinton campaign while he was working on the investigation into her use of a private email server.

Kadzik also emailed a “heads up” to Clinton campaign chair John Podesta, warning him when the release of Clinton’s emails was imminent. (RELATED: IG Report: FBI Agents Regularly Received Free Handouts From Journalists)

According to Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s report, made public Thursday afternoon, Kadzik’s failure to recuse himself showed “poor judgment.”

“We found that Kadzik demonstrated poor judgment by failing to recuse himself from Clinton-related matters under federal ethics regulations prior to November 2, 2016.”

Kadzik was criticized for an email sent to Clinton aide Brian Fallon in April of 2015 which read, “Hope all is well with you, [Fallon’s wife], the kids, and the candidate. Let me know if you or someone else needs a great assistant; my 25 year old son is ready for [Clinton].”

The Clinton campaign did not hire Kadzik’s son, but Horowitz determined that Kadzik still should have recused himself from all Clinton-related matters — which he did not.

A short time later, Kadzik sent an email to John Podesta titled simply “heads up.” In the email, he warned the campaign chair that Hillary Clinton’s emails were likely to be made public.

“There is a [House Judiciary Committee] oversight hearing today where the head of our Civil Division will testify. Likely to get questions on State Department emails. Another filing in the FOIA case went in last night or will file in this am that indicates it will be awhile (2016) before the State Department posts the [Clinton] emails.”

Horowitz determined that because the information had been made public by the time the email was sent, Kadzik could not be cited for abusing his official position. However, he also noted that Kadzik did not know the information was not public when he sent the email, which “raised a reasonable question about his ability to act impartially on Clinton-related matters in connection with his official duties.”

Kadzik’s email to Podesta was made public when the latter’s account was dumped by WikiLeaks. In November of 2016, DOJ leadership called for Kadzik’s recusal. In spite of that, Kadzik later forwarded several emails to Podesta in relation to the Clinton case.

He left the Justice Department in January of 2017 after an official inquiry determined that he had not forwarded any sensitive information.