--- title: Hillary Clinton Emails: What She Told FBI in Interview description: Hillary Clinton told the FBI she was unaware that she had to save her emails when she left office. canonical: https://time.com/4478107/hillary-clinton-emails-fbi-investigation-documents/ author: Tessa Berenson article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-09-02T18:21:21.000Z article:modified_time: 2024-01-17T15:51:55.000Z article:section: Politics og:title: Hillary Clinton Emails: What She Told FBI in Interview og:description: Hillary Clinton told the FBI she was unaware that she had to save her emails when she left office. og:url: https://time.com/4478107/hillary-clinton-emails-fbi-investigation-documents/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb16ab1d4df041567/6988a4bfcd1bbabea8702314/hillary-clinton-fbi-email.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2560 og:image:height: 1440 og:image:alt: Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton addresses the National Convention of the American Legion in Cincinnati og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Hillary Clinton Emails: What She Told FBI in Interview twitter:description: Hillary Clinton told the FBI she was unaware that she had to save her emails when she left office. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb16ab1d4df041567/6988a4bfcd1bbabea8702314/hillary-clinton-fbi-email.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Hillary Clinton Told FBI She Did Not Know She Had to Turn Over Work Emails > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters.  by [Tessa Berenson](https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/)  ## Tessa Berenson Updated: Jan 17, 2024 3:51 PM UTCPublished: Sep 2, 2016 6:21 PM UTC  Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton addresses the National Convention of the American Legion in Cincinnati on Aug. 31, 2016. Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton addresses the National Convention of the American Legion in Cincinnati on Aug. 31, 2016. Bryan Woolston—Reuters  by [Tessa Berenson](https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/)  ## Tessa Berenson Updated: Jan 17, 2024 3:51 PM UTCPublished: Sep 2, 2016 6:21 PM UTC In [new documents](http://time.com/4478075/fbi-hillary-clinton-interview-email-investigation/) released by the FBI summarizing the agency’s interview with Hillary Clinton about her email server, Clinton says she was unaware that she had to save her emails when she left office. Clinton told the FBI on July 2 that she recalls no briefing about preserving or producing her records when she transitioned out of her post as Secretary of State. The document notes that her transition coincided with her [2012 concussion and blood clot](http://time.com/3980454/hillary-clinton-health-doctor/?iid=sr-link2): “Because of her doctor’s advice, she could only work at State for a few hours a day and could not recall every briefing she received.” Clinton also said that when emails were marked (C), which State determined to hold confidential information, she did not know what the (C) meant and she thought it had to do with alphabetizing paragraphs. “Hillary Clinton’s answers to the FBI about her private email server defy belief. I was absolutely shocked to see that her answers to the FBI stood in direct contradiction to what she told the American people,” Donald Trump said in a statement. “After reading these documents, I really don’t understand how she was able to get away from prosecution.” The FBI interviewed Clinton as part of its investigation into her use of a private email server while Secretary of State. Days later, FBI Director James Comey [recommended that no criminal charges be brought](http://time.com/4393271/james-comey-fbi-hillary-clinton-email/?iid=sr-link1) against Clinton, though he said the agency found her to be “extremely careless” handling classified material. The material is included in 58 pages of documents from the FBI’s now-closed investigation. The documents include a summary of agents’ interviews with Clinton and her aides as well as technical details about how the server was designed. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4478107/hillary-clinton-emails-fbi-investigation-documents/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4478107/hillary-clinton-emails-fbi-investigation-documents/"},"headline":"Hillary Clinton Told FBI She Did Not Know She Had to Turn Over Work Emails","datePublished":"2016-09-02T18:21:21.000Z","dateModified":"2024-01-17T15:51:55.000Z","description":"Hillary Clinton told the FBI she was unaware that she had to save her emails when she left office.","url":"https://time.com/4478107/hillary-clinton-emails-fbi-investigation-documents/","keywords":["Hillary Clinton","2016 Election","FBI"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb16ab1d4df041567/6988a4bfcd1bbabea8702314/hillary-clinton-fbi-email.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Tessa Berenson","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb16ab1d4df041567/6988a4bfcd1bbabea8702314/hillary-clinton-fbi-email.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton addresses the National Convention of the American Legion in Cincinnati","caption":"Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton addresses the National Convention of the American Legion in Cincinnati on Aug. 31, 2016.","creditText":"Bryan Woolston—Reuters","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4478107/hillary-clinton-emails-fbi-investigation-documents/","name":"Hillary Clinton Told FBI She Did Not Know She Had to Turn Over Work Emails"}}]}] ```