An investigation by the State Department’s Office of the Inspector General found that Huma Abedin, the longtime Hillary Clinton aide who now serves as the vice chair of the former secretary of state’s presidential campaign, accepted nearly $10,000 in overpayments from the government agency.
According to the Washington Post, the investigation became public when Senate Judiciary Committee chair Sen. Chuck Grassley (R., Iowa) sent letters to Abedin, Secretary of State John Kerry, and the OIG on the matter late last week.
According to Grassley, the OIG "found at least a reasonable suspicion of a violation" of a law having to do with the "theft of public money through time and attendance fraud," indicating that investigators accuse Abedin of accepting payment for time she was on vacation or sick leave.
The letter alleges that records show Abedin never took vacation or sick time during her time working as an official in the State Department between January 2009 and February 2013. However, Grassley charges that Abedin was "on leave on numerous occasions," including a trip to Italy and France in 2011, according to the investigation.
Abedin formally contested the charge and demanded an administration review of the inquiry, her lawyers claiming that she worked while on vacation and following the birth of her child in December 2011.
"Huma Abedin is widely known as one of the hardest-working people in all of Washington during the nearly two decades she was in public service," attorney Karen Dunn said. "The IG report found a multitude of instances when she was working even when she was on maternity leave, yet its central charge was that she owes back pay for work missed while on leave. It simply doesn’t add up."
Abedin is accused of accepting $9,857 from Hillary Clinton’s State Department. The Clinton campaign refused to comment on the matter.
In the letter, Grassley also demands information from Abedin regarding her "special government employee" status that allowed her to work for the Clinton Foundation and a firm with ties to the Clintons during her last six months at State, a matter that the Senate Judiciary Committee has been probing since 2013 for possible violations to conflict-of-interest laws.
He contends that Abedin has not supplied all documentation requested by the committee in the probe two years ago and that revelations regarding her alleged use of private email "further inform the original request," demanding Abedin provide all documents requested by the committee in 2013 in addition to those regarding her time and attendance at the State Department.
He also requests she provide all emails forwarded from her account at State to any other non-work email accounts, among other documents and communications, by Aug. 10.