In a briefing Tuesday, State Department spokesperson Mark Toner said he did not know who let Hillary Clinton have a private server when she was secretary of state.
"Again, I’m not going to answer that question," Toner said. "I’m not going to litigate that question from the podium."
When pressed on the subject, he said, "People understood that she had a private server; I think we’ve talked about that in the past."
Toner said the level of the officials who knew about Hillary’s private email could be seen in the emails themselves. He would not say whether there was anyone at the State Department who was against Clinton having a private server.
"Again, these are questions that are appropriate, but appropriate for other processes," Toner said.
One of the emails in the newly released batch, sent by Clinton’s aide Huma Abedin, indicated that State Department IT professionals did not know Clinton was using a private server for government business.
Toner also had difficulty forming a coherent answer when asked whether Clinton’s private server was breached.
"Again, I don’t have an answer for you on that. That’s, uh, I-I-I-I-I don’t know," he said.
Questions about Clinton’s emails have dogged her since March, when it first came to light that she used a private server while at the State Department. Those questions have been repeatedly asked at State Department briefings as well as more and more emails are being released each month, keeping the issue fresh in the news into 2016.
The emails are slowly being released but thousands of emails Clinton deemed of a personal nature have already been deleted, and public trust in her has eroded as a result, as has her once wide leads in Democratic polling. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) now leads her in New Hampshire and has closed the gap considerably in Iowa.