Doo-doo getting deeper at RNC

Bush Officials Used RNC Server for Private E-mails
Disclosure Means Practice More Common Than Officials Acknowledged

By Paul Kane
washingtonpost.com Staff Writer

Almost 90 White House officials have maintained private e-mail accounts on the server of the Republican National Committee, including top advisers such as Karl Rove and former White House Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card, according to a House committee report released today.

The disclosure means the practice is much more common than Bush administration officials have previously acknowledged, the report noted.

The RNC has preserved more than 140,000 e-mails sent or received by Rove, but only 130 were written before President Bush won re-election in 2004, according to the report. The committee has preserved another 100,000 e-mails from two of Rove's top lieutenants, former White House political director Sara M. Taylor and deputy political director W. Scott Jennings, according to the House Oversight Committee.

But the RNC has no e-mail records for 51 of 88 White House officials -- such as Ken Mehlman, the White House political director from 2001 through early 2003 -- who used their servers in addition to government e-mail accounts, according to a summary of the panel's report.

The committee, chaired by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), has been investigating whether the e-mail accounts run by the RNC and the Bush-Cheney '04 campaign committee violated the Presidential Records Act, which requires that every White House official "assure that the activities, deliberations, decisions, and policies that reflect the performance of his constitutional, statutory, or other official or ceremonial duties are adequately documented."

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