The internal dynamics of Hillary Clinton’s top advisors in February 2015 included “secret s—t” that frustrated campaign manager Robby Mook.
Some of the 25,000 leaked documents belonging to Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta show Mr. Mook venting about the actions of Cheryl Mills and staffer Heather Samuelson. The vetting process for new hires was seemingly circumvented by Mrs. Mills, who engaged in “secret investigations” without his knowledge.
“Do you guys know what this is regarding?” Mr. Mook wrote on Feb. 23, 2015, in response to an email from Mrs. Samuelson.
“After our call Sunday and the situation with New Partners, I asked Heather to make sure we had properly vetted the paradigm for their engagement,” Mrs. Mills replied, the Daily Caller reported Tuesday. “I asked her to make sure we were following consistent standards so if anyone looked at any of our folks, we had the ability to say we reviewed and cleared their arrangement consistent with any conflicts. I assume she is following up.”
Mr. Mook, exasperated, countered, “all these secret investigations really need to stop. I literally don’t have time for these games,” before Mr. Podesta intervened.
“Not with you on this,” Mr. Podesta said. “Don’t view these as ’secret investigations’ but as establishing good practices. We need to get good systems in place at the outset.”
“That’s exactly my point,” Mr. Mook replied Feb. 24, 2015. “I have a process in place with Elias and Charlie — exactly what you and she asked. So why is she secretly dispatching Heather to investigate a problem she won’t even explain — a concern she supposedly has with a contract SHE wrote negotiated. What she is doing isn’t improving anything. It is secretly going around a transparent system we all agreed upon. It undermines Elias and Charlie and sucks up my time. If she has an issue —call or send an email, we can deal with it and move on. She can call Marc. But the secret s—t has to stop. It’s a giant time suck.”
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has vowed to released up to 50,000 of Mr. Podesta’s emails prior to the Nov. 8 presidential election. U.S. intelligence agencies blame Russian state actors for the theft.
Mr. Podesta’s stolen documents have allowed reporters and voters to glean information on the inner workings of the Clinton foundation and the Clinton campaign’s handling of the former secretary of state’s secret email server scandal.
• Douglas Ernst can be reached at dernst@washingtontimes.com.
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