i think that is why we ended up where we did on this. >> michael schmidt, a very busy man on the "newimes," appreciate your time tonight. >> we have more ahead tonight, stay with us, keeping an eye on the expected live speech from hillary clinton in washington. only her second public speech this year as she mounts an anticipated run for the presidency. al franken is at the podium now. >>> all right. >>> all right. reince priebus has a deal for you. dear friend, by nature is a nation of leaders, pioneers and trailblazers, we're not a nation that leads from behind or backs down from our principles. that's why we are bringing back the official cheney cowboy hat. friends, that's right, for a donation of $72 to the national republican party, you can get the vice president dick cheney cowboy hat, engraved with his signature and lined with the republican seal. order now. it sold out when they first put it out in december. but now it's back. in you're trying to decide whether you want it, you could see the real thing in action this week. dick cheney was at the u.s. capitol yesterday wearing t

joining us now is michael schmidt who has been covering this story for months thank you for your timeaving me. >> is it possible that paula broadwell. the biographer that she is potentially in legal jeopardy for having received this information improperly? >> i don't know that is a good question. was she a journalist in this fashion, and would that prosecute a journalist i don't think eric holder would want to go out on that note but i think she was cooperating and they said look we're not going to prosecute but we need to you cooperate. >> in terms of what general petraeus did, is this the sort of thing that frankly other cia directors and other top national security officers have been caught for in the past the sense that they mishandled classified information, but wasn't a real risk of serious harm in the moment. or is this something they think this information was potentially dangerous just going as far as he let it get. >> well the documents that no one else saw besides him, or is it something where stuff that we deal with in the media where we get information about a classified

here he is, michael schmidt. >> what doesn't make sense is they have known about this for many, many months. >> did they drop it? let me just try a couple theories. did you get this from oppo from the republicans? did you get it from the clinton people trying to put it out ahead of time? >> this was much harder. >> on your part. just enterprise. >> shoe leather. >> in that same interview, ann garen, a reporter covering the story for the "washington post" denied being tipped off by the hard right. here she is. >> that was a clean break. the republicans had nothing to do with it and that's become a narrative now on the democratic side is that this is a manufactured story that the republicans are pushing and that the media is biting on. and that's just not the way it happened. >> well, james carville and other clinton allies are doing here is familiar terrain, of course, back in 1998 clinton's camp blamed the monica lewinsky coverage on what they called a vast right-wing conspiracy. >> the great story here for anybody willing to find it and write about it and explain it is this vast rig

we don't know what we don't know were in those e-mails. >> totaleally inappropriate. >> michael schmidtreat reporting. we hope to see you back here. >> thanks. >>> sam tyne you let me bring you back here. this does play into a narrative about the clintons lack of transparency. she is required by this new regulation that is put into place to save all e-mails. she doesn't do that. she doesn't have a state department account. now she's deciding to release which ones she wants to release. do you suspect that this is -- this story is going to continue until we see all of those e-mails? >> i do expect that the story will go on. i don't know how long it will go on for. colin powell was required to keep records as the bush white house was. but it doesn't matter. if you violate this act, it doesn't matter what party you're from. you're not being transparent. the obama white house was that it claimed to be the most trans part in all of presidencies and it's problematic. for hillary clinton it feeds a narrative. whereas mitt romney's refusal to release his tax records fed the narrative that he was

michael schmidt was on msnbc earlier today. >> if she wasn't using a government account there was nol to keep them for recordkeeping, for oversight, and for historians to go back and look at it. essentially it was shielding her communications from those things. >> i'm joined by david axelrod and former rnc chair michael steele. some things we don't really expect with government. when you left the government, you had to turn over all the speech drafts, even though you're proud of a couple. there was even a ridiculous rule ear not even to xerox them. turn them all over, all your materials. i don't know what this formal custom how often it's honored or not, it's like don't take your pens home and use them at home. i wonder if it's one of those rules. you think this is something worth of the top of the fold "new york times" hillary clinton didn't yew her government eel may. >> it's not clear to me what rules she violated. there was some -- i saw a report late in the date that suggested the rules she allegedly may have vited were not in place at the time she was secretary of state. the on

observers have noted this is something she could have tried to answer questions for either back when michael schmidt of "the new york times" was working on stories about these e-mails to any time in the last eight days as you point out. it's a question as to why this has been allowed to build and build and build. it is a different media environment, even just in 2008 when hillary clinton ran. and there are issues about not only what is she revealing to the state department what is she not, why she felt the need to go against the state department's own rules, rules that the state department under her watch criticized individuals in the department for not abiding by but also there are questions about cyber security. as you know in 2013 one of hillary clinton's top advisers a guy named sidney blumenthal was hacked by a hacker and some of hillary clinton's e-mails were released into the public. gawker printed them. they didn't get a lot of attention at the time but they seem to be about detailed information having to do with the middle east and other items. and that was information that wouldn't fall un

joining us now is michael schmidt who has been covering this story for months.your time tonight. >> thank you for having me. >> is it possible that paula broadwell, the biographer the woman to whom he delivered this information, is she in potential legal jeopardy for having received this information improperly? that's a good question. was she acting as a journalist in this fashion? would they prosecute a journalist? i don't think eric holder would want to go out on that note. but i think she was cooperating and they said look we're not going to prosecute but we need you to cooperate. >> in terms of what general petraeus did, is this the sort of thing that frankly other cia directors and other top national security officers have been caught for in the past which is the sense they mishandled classified information that was potentially volunteer dangerous and had to be punished but there wasn't a real risk of serious home in the moment? or is this is something where they think that this information was potentially danger yousz even just going as far as he let it ge

joining me now is the reporter who broke the story michael schmidt. explain why this is an important distinction to make whether or not she was using personal e-mail or government issued account. >> what it is if she wasn't ugsing a government account then the state department had no way of cataloging and retaining all of her e-mails for record keeping purposes for congressional oversight, for freedom of information act requests and for historians to go back and look at it. essentially, it was shielding her communications from those things. >> so that gives the interpretation that it looks like she was trying to hide something xgt i want to read a statement from a clinton spokesman, both the letter and spirit of the rules permitted state department officials to use nongovernment e-mail as long as appropriate records were preserved. that's the big distinction there because now according toize say i can't cummings they have been turned over in full. what do you make of that? >> what the federal regulations call for is for the records to be preserved by

explosion of clinton spinning, and oh colin powell this -- well as the "new york times" reporter michael schmidte ignored the regulations that were put in place. >> and this machine that we all saw activating on twitter, in blog posts and putting clinton-type spokespeople on television, it was all to obscure the larger fact here. which is that -- >> what's the fact? >> by conducting your business on a private e-mail account, you are avoiding scrutiny and transparency. the kind of transparency that is required of public officials. >> so willie when you have a select committee asking for all e-mails related to a certain subject, and in this case benghazi, you don't actually have the official e-mails and just decide you're not going to respond. which is exactly what hillary clinton decided she was not going to do. >> and that's the example that comes out of this. that's the lead of the "new york times" piece this morning which is that the benghazi committee asked for all the correspondence from the state department. state department gives everything it thinks it has the benghazi committee said what