Justice to investigate White House e-mail problems

The Justice Department campaign finance task force has launched a criminal inquiry into whether White House computer breakdowns made it impossible to search incoming e-mails in response to congressional subpoenas regarding campaign finance and other issues, according to a White House counsel federal court filing.

"The task force intends to investigate allegations surrounding the White House e-mail system," according to the filing in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. The filing was related to a civil case involving the conservative legal organization Judicial Watch.

Earlier this month, House Government Reform Committee Chairman Dan Burton, R-Ind., said he was issuing a subpoena to the White House to determine why the administration failed to disclose that its servers held thousands of e-mails that could be relevant to a number of congressional investigations, including campaign finance and the siege at Waco, Texas.

According to Burton, the White House withheld from Congress that it failed to search White House e-mails between September 1996 and Nov. 20, 1998. The e-mails potentially included information relevant to the House Government Reform investigations of the administration's conduct.

The House Government Reform committee is holding hearings on the e-mail matter.

The filing says Justice's task force also plans to investigate whether individuals were threatened with retaliation to prevent the existence of e-mails from being revealed to the Justice Department and Burton.