The email angle on the Iranian scientist

This morning Senator Tom Cotton was on both FOX News Sunday and Face the Nation (full interview below) this morning to discuss the payment of ransom by the Obama administration to free American hostages from Iran (video below). On Face the Nation, Senator Cotton observed regarding the Iranian scientist whose execution Iran has just announced: “I’m not going to comment on what he may or may not have done for the United States government, but in the emails that were on Hillary Clinton’s private server, there were conversations among her senior advisors about this gentleman.”

The Associated Press places the email issue in this context:

Amiri’s case indirectly found its way back into the spotlight in the U.S. last year with the release of State Department emails sent and received by Clinton, now the Democratic presidential candidate. The release of those emails came amid criticism of Clinton’s use of a private account and server that has persisted into her campaign against Republican candidate Donald Trump.

An email forwarded to Clinton by senior adviser Jake Sullivan on July 5, 2010 — just nine days before Amiri returned to Tehran — appears to reference the scientist.

“We have a diplomatic, ‘psychological’ issue, not a legal one. Our friend has to be given a way out,” the email by Richard Morningstar, a former State Department special envoy for Eurasian energy, read. “Our person won’t be able to do anything anyway. If he has to leave so be it.”

Another email, sent by Sullivan on July 12, 2010, appears to obliquely refer to the scientist just hours before his appearance at the Pakistani Embassy became widely known.

“The gentleman … has apparently gone to his country’s interests section because he is unhappy with how much time it has taken to facilitate his departure,” Sullivan wrote. “This could lead to problematic news stories in the next 24 hours.”

According to Clinton, you may recall, any exposure of classified information on her server is the fault of the fine State Department professional who made the mistake of sharing it with her (and she was too stupid to recognize it).

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