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Former Hillary Clinton aide who set up email server to invoke Fifth Amendment

By Andrew V. Pestano
Presidential candidate and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton walks on the stage July 31 before delivering a speech at Florida International University in Miami. Late Monday, the State Department released more than 7,000 pages of her emails including some 150 that have been retroactively classified. File Photo by Gary I Rothstein/UPI
Presidential candidate and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton walks on the stage July 31 before delivering a speech at Florida International University in Miami. Late Monday, the State Department released more than 7,000 pages of her emails including some 150 that have been retroactively classified. File Photo by Gary I Rothstein/UPI | License Photo

WASHINGTON, Sept. 3 (UPI) -- Bryan Pagliano, the former aide to Hillary Clinton who helped set up the server that held the former Secretary of State's private email accounts, will invoke his Fifth Amendment right during a congressional committee.

Pagliano was subpoenaed on Aug. 11 to testify before the House Select Committee on Benghazi, but he will invoke the Fifth Amendment. He previously worked on Clinton's 2008 presidential campaign before he set up the server in Clinton's New York home in 2009.

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Pagliano has also been called to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee and the Senate Homeland Security Committee.

"Mr. Pagliano's legal counsel told the committee yesterday that he would plead the Fifth to any and all questions if he were compelled to testify," a spokesperson for Judiciary Committee Chairman Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, told Fox News late Wednesday.

Mark MacDougall, Pagliano's attorney, penned a letter explaining his client's decision. Pagliano was ordered to appear before the committee Sept. 10.

"While we understand that Mr. Pagliano's response to this subpoena may be controversial in the current political environment, we hope that the members of the Select Committee will respect our client's right to invoke the protections of the Constitution," MacDougall wrote.

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A portion of the Fifth Amendment states that no person "shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself."

The Department of State recently released more than 7,000 pages of Clinton's emails, including some 150 that have been retroactively classified. The sensitive information in the emails had been classified since Clinton originally received or sent them.

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