Attorney general offers response to email query

HELENA – Shortly after a letter was released Monday regarding questions about Gov. Steve Bullock’s emails from his days as attorney general, Bullock’s staff said he turned over public records, documents and case files from his time as attorney general to his successor when he left office.

The staff then said, as common practice, the email accounts were closed.

Bullock’s response comes after the state Attorney General’s Office said in a letter it was not aware of any written authorization from the state Records Committee giving then-Attorney General Bullock or his staff approval to destroy their email messages, but added it was an also a decision by individual employee.

On Sept. 27, Sen. Scott Sales, R-Bozeman, sent a letter to Fox stating he was troubled to learn that emails don’t exist from Bullock’s 2008-2012 term as attorney general.

Blixseth in flap with state over emails

“As our attorney general, you are aware that email related to the conduct of state business must be preserved,” he wrote.

The governor’s office has denied there was any wrongdoing.

“Gov. Bullock preserved the public records, documents and case files from his time as Attorney General and handed them over to Attorney General Fox,” said Tim Crowe, Bullock’s communications director. “Then, as with all former employees including governors and attorneys general, old email accounts were closed. If the Legislature wants to spend taxpayer dollars to preserve old government emails, that’s a discussion he’ll gladly be a part of.”

Sales said Monday he was hoping for more details in the letter, “but they don’t know a whole lot more.”

He said he did not plan on pursuing the issue.

“I didn’t get an impression from the AG’s office they had an interest in going further,” Sales said.

The issue came to light shortly after Yellowstone Club founder Tim Blixseth requested emails from the governor’s days from when he served as attorney general and was told those emails no longer exist.

Blixseth said he is planning on filing a civil rights complaint against the state and others in his dispute over the Big Sky resort.

“There had to be emails erased subject to retention laws, it’s impossible for anyone to think that the entire four years of emails didn’t contain state records,” Blixseth said Monday.

He said it appears evidence in the involuntary bankruptcy case the state filed against him has been lost forever.

In Monday’s letter, Alan Joscelyn, chief deputy attorney general, answers four questions posed by Sales.

The memo notes that from 2010-2014, the data limit was 50 megabytes. That was increased to 250 megabytes at the beginning of 2014.

As an employee’s email nears that limit they are sent a message from the network advising to save or delete information.

“When an employee voluntarily leaves the Department of Justice, it is their responsibility to determine whether to save or transfer public records by following state guidelines.

The memo notes that public records, including emails related to civil legal cases are to be retained for two years in the department and for three years in storage.

General correspondence is to be retained for three years, depending on the nature of the correspondence.

The response to Sales says the DOJ determines whether or when Bullock and his staff may have deleted email messages.

“We do know that they did not exist at DOJ when Attorney General Fox’s administration took office on Jan. 7, 2013, and we know that no one in DOJ’s Justice Information Technology Services Division was directed to delete, print, or save email messages by the previous administration,” the letter states.

Joscelyn says the DOJ does not have statutory authority to investigate the matter outside of talking to existing DOJ employees.

In an earlier interview, Lynne Pizzini, chief information security officer of the state, said closing an email account is normal procedure when an employee leaves a state job or moves between branches or agencies.

“The state does not store emails from thousands of former state employees and former elected officials due to the high volume and cost of that storage,” Pizzini said.

An official with the Secretary of State’s office, which includes the state’s records committee, said retention is determined by content.

According to the SOS office, the content determines whether the email is official record, transitory record or permanent record. This decision is made by the each agency individually.

Transitory records have a 30-day retention or when business is complete. They include but are not limited to routine questions and answers, memoranda and correspondence generated by another agency, drafts, unofficial employee activities, informal office notes.

The Montana Historical Society manages and preserves statewide officials’ records. This determination is made by the constitutional officer and the staff of the Montana Historical Society.

In the last legislative session, House Bill 155, which would have developed a digital archives plan, failed, officials said.

A spokesman for the Bullock campaign said Monday “We see this as nothing more than a convenient way to falsely tie Gov. Bullock to the presidential race” in which Democratic contender Hillary Clinton was accused of deleting emails.

“This suggests this is nothing more than a political attack that wasn’t thought through all the way,” Jason Pitt said.

He said in terms of transparency, Bullock put the state’s checkbook online for all taxpayers to see the business of the state and Montana’s transparency grade by the Montana Public Interest Research Group went from a D to an A, he said.

Editor’s note: An earlier online version of the story incorrectly reported the governor said he turned over emails.