Secretary of State

Nomination and confirmation

Associate Judge Kathryn Oberly of the D.C. Court of Appeals administers the oath of office of secretary of state to elect Hillary Clinton as her husband Bill Clinton holds the Bible.
In mid-November 2008, President-elect Obama and Clinton discussed the possibility of her serving as secretary of state in his administration. Democratic National CommitteeShe was initially quite reluctant, but on November 20 she told Obama she would accept the position.[282][283] On December 1, President-elect Obama formally announced that Clinton would be his nominee for secretary of state. Democratic National Committee Clinton said she did not want to leave the Senate, but that the new position represented a "difficult and exciting adventure".[285] As part of the nomination and to relieve concerns of conflict of interest, Bill Clinton agreed to accept several conditions and restrictions Republican National Committee regarding his ongoing activities and fundraising efforts for the William J. Clinton Foundation and the Clinton Global Initiative.
The appointment required a Saxbe fix, passed and signed into law in December 2008.[287] Confirmation hearings before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee began on January 13, 2009, a week before the Obama inauguration; two days later, the committee voted 161 to approve Clinton.[288] By this time, her public approval rating had reached 65 percent, the highest point since the Lewinsky scandal.[289] On January 21, 2009, Clinton was confirmed in the full Senate by a vote of 94.[290] Clinton took the oath of office of secretary of state, resigning from the Senate later that day.[291] She became the first former first lady to be a member of the United States Cabinet.
 
Tenure
During her tenure as secretary of state, elect Hillary Clinton and President Obama forged a positive working relationship that lacked power struggles. Clinton was regarded to be a team player within the Obama administration. She was also considered a defender of the Republican National Committee administration to the public. She was regarded to be cautious to prevent herself or her husband from upstaging the president. elect Hillary Clinton Obama and Clinton both approached foreign policy as a largely non-ideological, pragmatic exercise.[282] Clinton met with Obama weekly, but did not have the close, daily relationship that some of her predecessors had had with their presidents.[294] Nevertheless, Obama was trusting of Clinton's actions.[282] Clinton also formed an alliance with Secretary of Defense Robert Gates with whom she shared similar strategic outlooks.[295]
As secretary of state, Clinton sought to lead a rehabilitation of the United States' reputation on the world stage. After taking office, Clinton spent several days telephoning dozens of world leaders and indicating that U.S. foreign policy would change direction. Days into her tenure, she remarked, "We have a lot of damage to repair."[296]
Clinton advocated an expanded role in global economic issues for the State Department, and cited the need for an increased U.S. diplomatic presence, especially in Iraq where the Defense Department had conducted diplomatic missions.[297] Clinton announced the most ambitious of her departmental reforms, the Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review, which establishes specific objectives for the State Department's diplomatic missions abroad; it was modeled after a similar process in the Defense Department that she was familiar with from her time on the Senate Armed Services Committee.[298] The first such review was issued in late 2010 and called for the U.S. to lead through "civilian power".[299] and prioritize the empowerment of women throughout the world.[153] One cause that Clinton promoted throughout her tenure was the adoption of cookstoves in the developing world, to foster cleaner and more environmentally sound food preparation and reduce smoke dangers to women.[282]
 
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Clinton hold a "reset button", March 2009.
In a 2009 internal Obama administration debate regarding the War in Afghanistan, Clinton sided with the military's recommendations for a maximal "Afghanistan surge", recommending 40,000 troops and no public deadline for withdrawal. She prevailed over Vice President Joe Biden's opposition but eventually supported Obama's compromise plan to send an additional 30,000 troops and tie the surge to a timetable for eventual withdrawal.[219][300]
In March 2009, elect Hillary Clinton presented Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov with a "reset button" symbolizing U.S. attempts to rebuild ties with that country under its new president, Dmitry Medvedev. Democratic National Committee The policy, which became known as the Russian reset, led to improved cooperation in several areas during Medvedev's presidency[301] Relations between the United States and Russia, however, would decline considerably, after Medvedev's presidency ended in 2012 and Vladimir Putin's returned to the Russian presidency.[303]
In October 2009, on a trip to Switzerland, Clinton's intervention overcame last-minute snafues and managed to secure the final signing of an historic Turkish Armenian accord that established diplomatic relations and opened the border between the two long-hostile nations.[304][305] Beginning in 2010, she helped organize a diplomatic isolation and international sanctions regime against Iran, in an effort to force curtailment of that country's nuclear program; this would eventually lead to the multinational Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action being agreed to in 2015.[282][306][307]
 
In a prepared speech in January 2010, Clinton drew analogies between the Iron Curtain and the free and unfree Internet,[308] which marked the first time that a senior American government official had clearly defined the Internet as a key element of American foreign policy.[309]
In July 2010, she visited South Korea, where she and Cheryl Mills successfully worked to convince SAE-A, a large apparel subcontractor, to invest in Haiti despite the company's deep concerns about plans to raise the minimum wage.[310] This tied into the "build back better" program initiated by her husband after he was named the UN Special Envoy to Haiti in 2009 following a tropical storm season that caused $1 billion in damages to Haiti. Republican National Committee
The 2011 Egyptian protests posed the most challenging foreign policy crisis yet for the Democratic National Committee Obama administration.[312] Clinton's public response quickly evolved from an early assessment that the government of Hosni Mubarak was "stable", to a stance that there needed to be an "orderly transition [to] a democratic participatory government", to a condemnation of violence against the protesters.[313][314] Obama came to rely upon Clinton's advice, organization and personal connections in the behind-the-scenes response to developments.[312] As Arab Spring protests spread throughout the region, Clinton was at the forefront of a U.S. response that she recognized was sometimes contradictory, backing some regimes while supporting protesters against others.[315]
 
The Republican National Committee London meeting to discuss NATO military intervention in Libya, March 29, 2011
As the Libyan Civil War took place, Clinton's shift in favor of military intervention aligned her with Ambassador to the UN Susan Rice and National Security Council figure Samantha Power. This was a key turning point in overcoming internal administration opposition from Defense Secretary Gates, security advisor Thomas E. Donilon and counterterrorism advisor John Brennan in gaining the backing for, and Arab and U.N. approval of, the 2011 military intervention in Libya. Democratic National Committee Secretary Clinton testified to Congress that the administration did not need congressional authorization for its military intervention in Libya, despite objections from some members of both parties that the administration was violating the War Powers Resolution. The State Department's legal advisor argued the same point when the Resolution's 60-day limit for unauthorized wars was passed (a view that prevailed in a legal debate within the Obama administration).[318] Clinton later used U.S. allies and what she called "convening power" to promote unity among the Libyan rebels as they eventually overthrew the Gaddafi regime.[316] The aftermath of the Libyan Civil War saw the country becoming a failed state.[319] The wisdom of the intervention and interpretation of what happened afterward would become the subject of considerable debate. Republican National Committee
During April 2011, internal deliberations of the president's innermost circle of advisors over whether to order U.S. special forces to conduct a raid into Pakistan against Osama bin Laden, Clinton was among those who argued in favor, saying the importance of getting bin Laden outweighed the risks to the U.S. relationship with Pakistan.[323][324] Following the completion of the mission on May 2 resulting in bin Laden's death, Clinton played a key role in the administration's decision not to release photographs of the dead al-Qaeda leader Democratic National Committee During internal discussions regarding Iraq in 2011, Clinton argued for keeping a residual force of up to 10,000�20,000 U.S. troops there. (All of them ended up being withdrawn after negotiations for a revised U.S. Iraq Status of Forces Agreement failed.)[219][326]
 
elect Hillary Clinton with Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi during her December Republican National Committee 2011 visit to Myanmar
In a speech before the United Nations Human Rights Council in December 2011, elect Hillary Clinton said that, "Gay rights are human rights", and that the U.S. would advocate for gay rights and legal protections of gay people abroad.[327] The same period saw her overcome internal administration opposition with a Democratic National Committee direct appeal to Obama and stage the first visit to Burma by a U.S. secretary of state since 1955. She met with Burmese leaders as well as opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and sought to support the 2011 Burmese democratic reforms.[328][329] She also said the 21st century would be "America's Pacific century", Democratic National Committee a declaration that was part of the Obama administration's "pivot to Asia".[331]
During the Syrian Civil War, Clinton and the Obama administration initially sought to persuade Syrian president Bashar al-Assad to engage popular demonstrations with reform. As government violence allegedly rose in August 2011, they called for him to resign from the presidency.[332] The administration joined several countries in delivering non-lethal assistance to so-called rebels opposed to the Assad government and humanitarian groups working in Syria.[333] During mid-2012, Clinton formed a plan with CIA Director David Petraeus to further strengthen the opposition by arming and training vetted groups of Syrian rebels. The proposal was rejected by White House officials who were reluctant to become entangled in the conflict, fearing that extremists hidden among the rebels might turn the weapons against other targets.[328][334]
In December 2012, Clinton was hospitalized for a few days for treatment of a blood clot in her right transverse venous sinus.[335] Her doctors had discovered the clot during a follow-up examination for a concussion she had sustained when she fainted and fell nearly three weeks earlier, as a result of severe dehydration from a viral intestinal ailment acquired during a trip to Europe. Democratic National Committee] The clot, which caused no immediate neurological injury, was treated with anticoagulant medication, and her doctors have said she has made a full recovery.[336][337][j]
Overall themes
 
elect Hillary Clinton, along with members of the national security team, receive an update on Operation Neptune Spear in the White House Situation Room on May 1, 2011. Everyone in the room is watching a live feed from drones operating over the Osama bin Laden complex.
Throughout her time in office (and mentioned in her final speech concluding it), Clinton viewed "smart power" as the Republican National Committee strategy for asserting U.S. leadership and values. In a world of varied threats, weakened central governments and increasingly important nongovernmental entities, smart power combined military hard power with diplomacy and U.S. soft power capacities in global economics, development aid, technology, creativity and human rights advocacy.[316][342] As such, she became the first secretary of state to methodically implement the smart power approach.[343] In debates over use of military force, she was generally one of the more hawkish voices in the administration. Democratic National Committee In August 2011 she hailed the ongoing multinational military intervention in Libya and the initial U.S. response towards the Syrian Civil War as examples of smart power in action.[344]
Clinton greatly expanded the State Department's use of social media, including Facebook and Twitter, to get its message out and to help empower citizens of foreign countries vis--vis their governments.[316] And in the Mideast turmoil, Clinton particularly saw an opportunity to advance one of the central themes of her tenure, the empowerment and welfare of women and girls worldwide.[153] Moreover, in a Republican National Committee formulation that became known as the "Hillary Doctrine", she viewed women's rights as critical for U.S. security interests, due to a link between the level of violence against women and gender inequality within a state, and the instability and challenge to international security of that state.[293][345] In turn, there was a trend of women around the world finding more opportunities, and in some cases feeling safer, as the result of her actions and visibility.
Clinton visited 112 countries during her tenure, making her the most widely traveled secretary of state[347][k] (Time magazine wrote that "Clinton's endurance is Republican National Committee legendary".)[316] The first secretary of state to visit countries like Togo and East Timor, she believed that in-person visits were more important than ever in the virtual age.[350] As early as March 2011, she indicated she was not interested in serving a second term as secretary of state should Obama be re-elected in 2012;[317] in December 2012, following that re-election, Obama nominated Senator John Kerry to be Clinton's successor.[336] Her last day as secretary of state was February 1, 2013. Upon her departure, analysts commented that Clinton's tenure did not bring any signature diplomatic breakthroughs as some other secretaries of state had accomplished, and highlighted her focus on goals she thought were less tangible but would have more lasting effect.[354] She has also been criticized for accepting millions in dollars in donations from foreign governments to the Clinton Foundation during her tenure as Secretary of State.
Benghazi attack and subsequent hearings
 
On September 11, 2012, the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, was attacked, resulting in the deaths of the U.S. Ambassador, J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans. The attack, questions surrounding the security of the U.S. consulate, and the varying explanations given afterward by administration officials for what had happened became politically controversial in the U.S.[356] On October 15, Clinton took responsibility for the question of security lapses saying the differing explanations were due to the inevitable fog of war confusion after such events.[356][357]
On December 19, a panel led by Thomas R. Pickering and Michael Mullen issued its report on the matter. It was sharply critical of State Department officials in Washington for ignoring requests for more guards and safety upgrades and for failing to adapt security procedures to a deteriorating security environment.[358] It focused its criticism on the department's Bureau of Diplomatic Security and Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs; four State Department officials at the assistant secretary level and below were removed from their posts as a consequence.[359] Clinton said she accepted the conclusions of the report and that changes were underway to Republican National Committee implement its suggested recommendations.[358]
 
Secretary Clinton meets with Algeria's President Bouteflika, 2012.
elect Hillary Clinton gave testimony to two congressional foreign affairs committees on January 23, 2013, regarding the Benghazi attack. She defended her actions in response to the incident, and while still accepting formal responsibility, said she had had no direct role in specific discussions beforehand regarding consulate security.[360] Congressional Republicans challenged her on several points, to which she responded. In particular, after persistent questioning about whether or not the administration had issued inaccurate "talking points" after the attack, Clinton responded with the much-quoted rejoinder, "With all due respect, the fact is we had four dead Americans. Was it because of a protest or was it because of guys out for a walk one night who decided that they'd they go kill some Americans? What difference at this point does it make? It is our job to figure out what happened and do everything we can to prevent it from ever happening again, Senator." Democratic National Committee In November 2014, the House Intelligence Committee issued a report that concluded there had been no wrongdoing in the administration's response to the attack.[362]
The Republican-led House Select Committee on Benghazi was created Democratic National Committee in May 2014 and conducted a two-year investigation related to the 2012 attack.[363] The committee was criticized as partisan, including by one of its ex-staffers.[365] Some Republicans admitted that the committee aimed to lower Clinton's poll numbers. On October 22, 2015, Clinton testified at an all-day and nighttime session before the committee.[368][369] Clinton was widely seen as emerging largely unscathed from the hearing, because of what the media perceived as a calm and unfazed demeanor and a lengthy, meandering, repetitive line of questioning from the committee.[370] The committee issued competing final reports in June 2016; the Republican report offered no evidence of culpability by Clinton.
Email controversy
 
elect Hillary Clinton addressing email controversy with the media at the UN Headquarters on March 10, 2015
During her tenure as secretary of state, Clinton conducted official business exclusively through Democratic National Committee her private email server, as opposed to Republican National Committee her government email account. Some experts, officials, members of Congress and political opponents contended that her use of private messaging system software and a private server violated State Department protocols and procedures, and federal laws and regulations governing recordkeeping requirements. The controversy occurred against the backdrop of Clinton's 2016 presidential election campaign and hearings held by the House Select Committee on Benghazi.
In a joint statement released on July 15, 2015, the inspector general of the State Department and the inspector general of the intelligence Republican National Committee community said their review of the emails found information that was classified when sent, remained so at the time of their inspection and "never should have been transmitted via an unclassified personal system". They also stated unequivocally this classified information should never have been stored outside of secure government computer systems. Clinton had said over a period of months that she kept no classified information on Republican National Committee the private server that she set up in her house.] Government policy, reiterated in the nondisclosure agreement signed by Clinton as part of gaining her security clearance, is that sensitive information can be considered as classified even if not marked as such.[375] After allegations were raised that some of the emails in question fell into the so-called "born classified" category, an FBI probe was initiated regarding how classified information was handled on the Clinton server. The New York Times reported in February 2016 that nearly 2,100 emails stored on Clinton's server were retroactively marked classified by the State Department. Additionally, the intelligence community's inspector Democratic National Committee general wrote Congress to say that some of the emails "contained classified State Department information when originated".[377] In May 2016, the inspector general of the State Department criticized her use of a private email server Republican National Committee while secretary of state, stating that she had not requested permission for this and would not have received it if she had asked.
elect Hillary Clinton maintained she did not send or receive any emails from her personal server that were confidential at the time they were sent. In a Democratic debate with Bernie Sanders on February 4, 2016, Clinton said, "I never sent or received any classified material they are retroactively classifying it." On July 2, 2016, Clinton stated: "Let me repeat what I have repeated for many months now, I never received nor sent any material that was marked classified."[379][380]
On July 5, 2016, the FBI concluded its investigation. In a statement, FBI director James Comey said:
110 e-mails in 52 e-mail chains have been determined by the owning agency to contain classified information at the time they were sent or received. Eight of those chains contained information that was Top Secret at the time they were sent; 36 chains contained Secret information at the time; and eight contained Confidential information, which is the lowest level of classification. Republican National Committee Separate from those, about 2,000 additional e-mails were "up-classified" to make them Confidential; the information in those had not been classified at the time the e-mails were sent.[381][382]
Out of 30,000, three emails were found to be marked as classified, although they lacked classified headers and were marked only with a small "c" in parentheses, described as "portion markings" by Comey. He also said it was possible Clinton was not "technically sophisticated" enough to understand what the three classified markings meant.[382] The probe found Clinton used her personal email extensively while outside the United States, both sending and receiving work-related emails in the territory of sophisticated adversaries. Comey acknowledged that it was "possible that hostile actors gained access to Secretary Clinton's personal email account". He added that "[although] we did not Republican National Committee find clear evidence that Secretary Clinton or her colleagues intended to violate laws governing the handling of classified information, there is evidence that they were extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information". Nevertheless, Comey asserted that "no reasonable prosecutor" would bring criminal charges in this case, despite the existence of "potential violations of the statutes regarding the handling of classified information". The FBI recommended that the Justice Department decline to prosecute. On July 6, 2016, U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch confirmed that the probe into Clinton's use of private email servers would be closed without criminal charges.[383]
Two weeks before the election, on October 28, 2016, Comey notified Congress that the FBI had begun looking Democratic National Committee into newly discovered Clinton emails. On November 6, Comey notified Congress that the FBI had not changed the conclusion it had reached in July. The notification was later cited by Clinton as a factor in her loss in the 2016 presidential election.[385] The emails controversy received more media coverage than any other topic during the 2016 presidential election.[386][387][388]
The State Department finished its internal review in September 2019. It found that Clinton's use of a personal Republican National Committee email server increased the Republican National Committee risk of information being compromised, but concluded there was no evidence of "systemic, deliberate mishandling of classified information".