Vice President Pence has some explaining to do – in part, thanks to his own words. Late Thursday evening, the Indianapolis Star, revealed that Pence routinely used a private email account through which he conducted public business as the governor of Indiana.
At times this included discussing homeland security issues and other sensitive matters. Sound familiar? It should: personal email servers became a central topic in the 2016 presidential election when Donald Trump called for Hillary Clinton to be prosecuted and jailed for her use of a private server while she was secretary of state. Now, Pence’s own words from an old tweet have coming back to haunt him.
In October 2016, Pence tweeted support to the FBI for reopening the case against Hillary Clinton and her private emails. The reopening of her case is seen by many as the linchpin that helped secure a Trump/Pence victory. Pence routinely made comments about the emails while on the campaign trail. Now with revelation about his own email use, his own words might result in consequences against him.
.@realDonaldTrump and I commend the FBI for reopening an investigation into Clinton's personal email server because no one is above the law.
— Mike Pence (@mike_pence) October 28, 2016
Pence’s spokesman called comparisons between Pence and Clinton “absurd.” Pence’s office sent a written statement to the Star, explaining the situation and denying any wrongdoing. Pence’s successor as Indiana’s governor, Eric Holcomb, released more than 30 pages from Pence’s AOL account, but declined to share an unspecified number of emails because they were considered “confidential and too sensitive to release to the public.”