Big fib

Convention but no Hillary

Why no Hillary

Illegal for Hillary to be there

Hatch Act references

The Hatch Act as Amended

The Hatch Act of 1939

Federal employees limited in partisan political activities

Justice Department explains

Sorry, but an unidentified senior Obama administration official needs to go back and check the law before mouthing off.

It is not “illegal” under the so-called Hatch Act for a secretary of state to attend a political function. As a matter of fact, such high-level political policy-making presidential appointees are specifically exempted from the provisions of the Hatch Act.

For those who are not familiar with the “Hatch Act”, it was initially passed in 1939 to prohibit federal government employees from having to work in the political campaigns of their elected masters. Sounds quite reasonable to me; however, the act was amended in 1993 (and went into effect in 1994) to make it easier for those federal employees to express their political views. Those amendments did not bar the secretaries of state and defense or the attorney general from attending political meetings such as the national conventions.

Now, then-President Clinton delegated the authority to those three (but not others) to put out “rules” and guidelines that limited what political activities could be involved in, but did not explicitly say: The Secretary can not participate. Beep! Wrong answer.

So, despite what the senior Obama administration official was saying, there was no law banning her from the Democratic National Convention … and if there is, I wish someone would show me exactly where it says that a secretary of state is barred from attending such a political convention.

No, folks. This unfortunately is a big fib, being pushed along by the reporter at CNN and others.

Good try, though.