A judge in Alaska has ordered the state to preserve any business-related emails sent by Sarah Palin from her private email accounts. Palin’s emails have generated a lot of attention, possibly because the situation mirrors the Bush Administration’s own missing emails scandal.
We know that Palin is withholding 1,100 emails from open records requests on the grounds that they are protected by executive privilege, despite the fact that her husband was frequently a recipient of the emails.
We know that Palin used private email accounts for public business, a tactic used by the Bush Administration to deter oversight. We also know that the Palin Administration has declared that making the emails in these accounts public will require so much work and time that it is impossible for them to be released before the election.
Finally, we know that as mayor of Wasilla, Palin used her official city account to campaign for higher office, a seeming violation of Alaskan state law that has gone unaddressed.
The action of the court may lead to greater oversight down the road, but it is unlikely anything Governor Palin is hiding will come to light before the all-important date of November 4th.
