Massive Number of White House Emails Deleted

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Quick follow up on the missing emails story. Here’s what we know: the White House has been using nongovernmental email addresses, specifically ones administered by the RNC, in order to keep its correspondence out of the hands of investigators and historians. Congress caught wind of these nongovernmental email addresses through an entirely separate investigation, looked into the issue, and found that many of the emails sent through the RNC had been deleted.

Now we find that many, many more have been deleted than previously thought. The White House originally said that about 50 White House officials had RNC email accounts. But Henry Waxman and his supersleuth committee have found that there were at least 88 officials with secondary email addresses, and that emails for 51 of them have been completely lost.

While this shakes ones trust in our government — what do they have to hide? — the good news is that this is a potential violation of the Presidential Records Act, and officials scared of being indicted may take immunity in exchange for ratting out their superiors. Eighty-eight officials with nongovernmental emails is a coordinated, deliberate attempt to drive a stake through the heart of open government, and it must have been directed at the highest levels. Further investigation of Rove, anyone?

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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