President Obama Defends Hillary Clinton E-Mail Use
BERMAN: President Obama says he is staying out of the Hillary Clinton e-mail controversy and will not interfere with the justice department investigation. In an interview with Fox News on Sunday, the President, however, defended the former secretary's use of e-mails saying she did not jeopardize national security. CNN Legal Analyst Paul Callan is with us and Athena Jones joins us from the White House. Athena, first lay out exactly what the President said here.</s>ATHENA JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi John. Well, as you said, the President defended Hillary Clinton's use of the e-mails and these e- mail system that she was using and said that even though she may have been careless in the management of classified e-mails he doesn't think it affected national security and he seem to down played the issue all together. Take a listen exactly how he put it in the interview.</s>BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF UNITED STATES: I continue to believe that she has not jeopardized America's National Security. Now, what I've also said is that and she's acknowledged, that there's a carelessness in terms of managing e-mails that she has owned and she recognizes. But I also think it is important to keep this in perspective. This is somebody who served her country for four years as Secretary of State and did an outstanding job.</s>JONES: And so, you hear the President defending the former secretary but some might say he is prejudging the outcome of these ongoing investigations by saying, insisting more than once that he doesn't believe she put National Security at risk so it will be interesting to see the response to that, John?</s>BERMAN: He is also making in some cases a similar argument that you are hearing from the Clinton campaign itself that there's classified and there's classified, literally he said pretty much that, when it comes to e-mails.</s>JONES: He did say pretty much that. He said, look, I'm a person who deals with a lot of classified information. Something maybe labeled top secret and it may in fact be quite sensitive. Other things maybe labeled top secret or classified and not be quite sensitive. There might be thins that you could find through open source information, through information available to the public. So that is very much in line with what we heard from the Clinton team talking about classification run amok and a lot of debate about whether some of these e-mails ever should have been classified. So we are hearing him weigh in on her side on that front as well. John?</s>BERMAN: Athena, stand by. Paul Callan, classified, is there any legal definition to that term?</s>PAUL CALLAN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, there is a legal definition in the sense that the statutes which, you know, the justice department is looking at here, will -- they have a definition that they work with about classified documents, documents that fall into certain categories are classified. Is there an objective statute that says what kinds of things are classified and not know there isn't? You now, it gets labeled as classified, if it gets labeled as top secret for the purpose of criminal law, that's what it is. And the President is saying, well, this kind of classified and kind of not classified. Well, how would you prosecute anybody like a real traitor to this country, who released damaging classified information if it was sort of like a moving scale as to how you design classified?</s>BERMAN: So does the President commenting on it as much as he did. He went only so far but he'd say quite a bit. Is that prejudice the case?</s>CALLAN: Well, you know, I'm surprised that he went as far as he did. I certainly understand him supporting Hillary Clinton. She was his secretary of state. However, he's also the Chief Prosecutor in the country. As the President he appoints the attorney general. He theoretically controls the justice department. Does it sound like he's sending a little message to the justice department that, I don't think you should prosecute Hillary Clinton? It certainly sounds like that. He should have, I think, said she was a great secretary of state. I can't imagine she would damage deliberately the interest of the United States, but I'm leaving it entirely in the hands of the justice department because I haven't read the e-mails. And that's the other thing. He says none of these -- he said I would doubt that she'd damage national security. Well, I don't, did he read all of the e-mails involved to see? Or is he just talking off the cuff. We don't know because he left the statement vague.</s>BERMAN: It says her former law professor the guy knows the law in theory and he knows what he's saying in potential impact of his words.</s>CALLAN: Yes, he does. I think he knows enough to know that presidents should stay clear of this. I mean, Richard Nixon, just to harken back to a Republican example, one of things he was charged with manipulating justice department investigations.</s>BERMAN: Well but no one is suggesting that the president's manipulating the investigations now.</s>CALLAN: Not at all. But when you get in to a situation where the chief executive officer the president of United States is kind of commenting on on-going investigations it's generally not a good thing.</s>BERMAN: Could his words be used in an actual trial?</s>CALLAN: No. I think everything that he said would be inadmissible in trial and really just kind of sending a subliminal message to the investigators.</s>BERMAN: The question is, is he putting he finger on the scale of the investigation?</s>CALLAN: Yeah.</s>BERMAN: Paul Callan, Athena Jones. Thanks so much. Up next, Bruce Springsteen and Bryan Adams they take a stand. 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