Hillary Clinton email scandal does damage control | CNN Politics

Hillary Clinton's email troubles

lead live keilar clinton work emails_00015612.jpg

Now playing

02:31

Clinton: 'Would've been better' to use official email

CNN Illustration/Getty Images

Now playing

00:46

Toobin: Not a good day for the FBI

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

SAN FRANCISCO, CA - MARCH 28: Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton delivers a keynote address during the 28th Annual Professional Business Women of California conference on March 28, 2017 in San Francisco, California. Hillary Clinton delivered the keynote address at the day-long conference featuring speakers, seminars and panel discussions with industry leaders. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Now playing

02:14

See key moments from the Clinton email scandal (2018)

The Hill

title: duration: 00:00:00 site: author: published: intervention: yes description:

Now playing

01:53

Sessions: Clinton probe report will reassure US

CNN

James Comey Town Hall 4-25-18-2

Now playing

02:38

Comey: It was a nightmare of a decision

CNN Annotation/White House Photo

Now playing

01:55

Trump adviser pursued Clinton emails on dark web

James Comey Loretta Lynch matter investigation queasy_00000000.jpg

Now playing

02:06

Comey: Lynch request gave me queasy feeling

Mark Wilson/Getty Images

U.S. President Donald Trump waves as he walks with his wife Melania to Marine One while departing from the White House on July 12, 2017 in Washington, DC. President Trump is traveling to France where he will meet with President Emmanuel Macron and will attend Bastille Day events on Friday.

Now playing

02:49

The path to Trump's call for Russia to 'find' Clinton emails

Pool

Mike Pence defends private email server sot_00000000.jpg

Now playing

01:00

Pence defends private email use

KTTC, KIMT, Twitter, Legacy.com, Chicago Sun-Times

GOP operative Peter Smith committed suicide at age 81 shortly after describing to the WSJ his efforts online to track down Hillary Clinton's emails, which he believed had been hacked and stolen from her private server.

Now playing

03:14

GOP activist hunted Clinton emails, found dead

cnnee pkg rodriguez clinton global iniciative hillary emails_00002301.jpg

Now playing

02:47

Hillary Clinton's explanations of her email saga

SOTU Lynch comey letter_00004405.jpg

Now playing

01:42

Lynch: My views on Comey letter were known

New York Times

hillary clinton

Now playing

02:42

Warrant sheds light on Clinton email probe

NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/AFP/Getty Images

US President Barack Obama and Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton arrive at a campaign event in Charlotte, North Carolina, on July 5, 2016. / AFP / NICHOLAS KAMM (Photo credit should read NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/Getty Images)

Now playing

01:04

Obama: Hillary Clinton was not treated fairly

Alex Wong/Getty Images

WASHINGTON, DC - SEPTEMBER 27: FBI Director James Comey waits for the beginning of a hearing before the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee September 27, 2016 on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. The committee held a hearing on "Fifteen Years After 9/11: Threats to the Homeland." (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Now playing

01:32

FBI clears Clinton in email probe

Getty Images

Now playing

01:28

Trump: Clinton is guilty and she knows it

Washington CNN —

Former secretary of State and likely 2016 White House aspirant Hillary Clinton sought to tamp down concerns about her use of private email while leading the State Department during a press conference at the United Nations on Tuesday. While she maintained she had not broken any rules, she also said she would not be turning over the private server housing her correspondence, despite calls for her to release it for an independent review.

Clinton said she used a private domain for her official work during her time at the State Department out of “convenience,” but admitted in retrospect “it would have been better” to use multiple emails.

“I opted for convenience to use my personal email account, which was allowed by the State Department, because I thought it would be easier to carry just one device for my work and for my personal emails instead of two,” she said. “Looking back, it would have been better if I’d simply used a second email account and carried a second phone, but at the time, this didn’t seem like an issue.”

READ: Did she do anything wrong or not?

The former secretary of state defended her process in choosing which emails to turn over to the State Department, telling reporters that she and her staff “err[ed] on the side of providing anything that could be possibly viewed as work-related.”

A statement from her office outlined the process by which she chose which emails to turn over, revealing it included a search for the names of State Department staffers, anything from a “.gov” email address and various keyword searches of the emails sent and received during her time at the State Department.

“I trust the American people to make their decisions about political and public matters and I feel like I’ve taken unprecedented steps for these emails to be in the public domain,” Clinton said. “I went above and beyond what I was requested to do.”

But that reassurance will likely fall short for critics who point out there’s no way of verifying her team turned over all government-related emails no matter how politically damaging they may be.

In the 20-minute press conference, Clinton answered an array of questions raised by the revelation that she exclusively used a private server and domain for her official business during her time at state. And in a sign of how much the Clinton team wants to nip the controversy in the bud, they issued a detailed, nine-page memo outlining answers to a series of common questions surrounding the controversy.

During her press conference, Clinton said that the 55,000 pages of correspondence she turned over to the State Department for review made up about half, or 30,000, of the overall 60,000 emails she sent and received with the private server. The statement later disclosed that about 90% of those had already been archived in the State Department’s records, as they had been sent to “.gov” accounts, which are automatically archived.

The other 30,000 — which included everything from wedding planning to yoga routines, Clinton said — she deleted.