WASHINGTON -- At a Senate Homeland Security Committee hearing on Central American migrants on Oct. 21, Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) unexpectedly found himself on the defensive about information he had released about Hillary Clinton's private email server.
Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) accused Johnson, the chair of the committee, of cherry-picking details that would make Clinton look bad, and she challenged him to release all the documents he had. Under pressure, Johnson agreed to do so.
Two weeks later, however, those papers still aren't out.
The documents, which consisted of Johnson's correspondence with software companies about Clinton's private server, suggested the server was vulnerable to cyberattacks. Republicans have tried to argue that Clinton, who is now running for president, mishandled sensitive information as secretary of state.
On Tuesday, Johnson told The Huffington Post that he believed those documents had already been released.
"We agreed to release the information that Sen. McCaskill was asking for and we've done so," he said. "We've given it to her, [and] I think we've probably released it to the public."
"The documents still aren’t public," McCaskill spokeswoman Sarah Feldman said in response.
The Homeland Security Committee's GOP staffers permitted McCaskill to personally view the documents once -- under their supervision -- but she was not allowed to keep them.
Johnson's office clarified later on Tuesday that while McCaskill has reviewed all the documents, they are not yet public.
"Our committee intends to release the documents once the redaction process is finished," a spokesperson for Johnson said. The office did not answer a question about when the documents are likely to be released.
At the hearing, McCaskill said she wanted all the details about Clinton's documents to be made public because she was concerned that "the selective release of information has created a public narrative that prejudges the outcome of the investigation and creates an incomplete and potentially misleading picture for the public of the record before the committee."
Johnson responded that the committee was "all about transparency" and accused McCaskill, a supporter of Clinton's presidential bid, of politicizing the issue.
"If you're truly serious about working with me, I think you would have first talked to me privately," he said.
The Senate Homeland Security Committee's investigation into Clinton's use of an email server is separate from the investigation being carried out by the House Select Committee on Benghazi -- which is supposed to be focusing on the 2012 terrorist attack in Libya, but has mostly been focusing on Clinton.
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