Ex-Clinton aides to give depositions in email server lawsuit

WASHINGTON, May 18 (UPI) -- Top aides to Hillary Clinton have agreed to be deposed in a civil lawsuit over the former secretary of state's use of a private email server.

Cheryl Mills, the former chief of staff, and Huma Abedin, her deputy chief of staff, are among depositions set up by Judicial Watch in a Freedom of Information Act case.

U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan ruled May 4 that the conservative group could depose six current and former senior Clinton and department aides in the group's lawsuit in a 2013 public records request for information about Abedin's employment.

Judicial Watch issued subpoenas for the May 27 deposition of Mills and a June 28 session with Abedin, who now is vice chairwoman of Clinton's Democratic presidential campaign.

Patrick Kennedy, the current undersecretary of state, will be questioned on June 29.

Lewis Lukens, a former deputy assistant secretary of state, was to be the first former Clinton aide to be deposed Wednesday.

The conservative group also has asked a different federal judge, Royce C. Lamberth, to depose Clinton in a second lawsuit on whether the State Department violated open-records laws by allowing the setup.

They want information about talking points Susan Rice used as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations for TV interviews about the Sept. 11, 2012, attack on U.S. Embassy in Benghazi.

In a statement to reporters, Clinton campaign spokesman Brian Fallon called deposing her a partisan smear campaign.

"Judicial Watch continues to clog the courts with its partisan lawsuits intended only to hurt Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign," Fallon said. "This suit's original purpose was to chase bogus allegations about Benghazi talking points, but with that conspiracy theory debunked, it is now being repurposed to continue to attack Hillary Clinton."