布什政府千萬封遺失電郵被發現

Computer technicians have found 22 million missing White House e-mails from the administration of President George W. Bush and the Obama administration is searching for dozens more days' worth of potentially lost e-mail from the Bush years, according to two groups that filed suit over the failure by the Bush White House to install an electronic record keeping system.

The two private groups — Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington and the National Security Archive — said Monday they were settling the lawsuits they filed against the Executive Office of the President in 2007.

It will be years before the public sees any of the recovered e-mails because they will now go through the National Archives' process for releasing presidential and agency records. Presidential records of the Bush administration won't be available until 2014 at the earliest.

The tally of missing e-mails, the additional searches and the settlement are the latest development in a political controversy that stemmed from the Bush White House's failure to install a properly working electronic record keeping system. Two federal laws require the White House to preserve its records.

The two private organizations say there is not yet a final count on the extent of missing White House e-mail and there may never be a complete tally.

Meredith Fuchs, general counsel to the National Security Archive, said "many poor choices were made during the Bush administration and there was little concern about the availability of e-mail records despite the fact that they were contending with regular subpoenas for records and had a legal obligation to preserve their records."

"We may never discover the full story of what happened here," said Melanie Sloan, CREW's executive director. "It seems like they just didn't want the e-mails preserved."

Sloan said the latest count of misplaced e-mails "gives us confirmation that the Bush administration lied when they said no e-mails were missing."

日前，曾以未安裝電子記錄存檔系統而對布什政府提起訴訟的兩個組織表示，電腦技術人員已發現布什任職期間白宮遺失的2200萬封電子郵件。奧巴馬政府也正對布什在任期間可能遺失的更多郵件進行追查。

對布什政府提起訴訟的兩個私人組織爲華盛頓公民責任與道德組織和國家安全檔案處。這兩個組織於本週一表示，他們於2007年對總統行政辦公室提起的訴訟近日結案。

但在很長一段時間內，美國公衆還是無法看到這些被發現的郵件，因爲這些郵件需要經過美國國家檔案館的審覈，之後與總統和政府機構有關的記錄才能公佈。這些被發現的布什任職期間的記錄最早將於2014年公開。

當年，布什政府因未安裝電子記錄存檔系統而引發政治爭議，最近發現的遺失郵件，後續追查以及訴訟的結案都是這一事件的最新進展。美國有兩項聯邦法律規定白宮有必要保存郵件記錄。

這兩個私人組織稱，白宮遺失郵件的具體數字目前還無法確定，而這個數字也許將永遠成爲一個謎團。

國家安全檔案處的總顧問梅雷迪思•富克斯說：“布什政府曾做過很多糟糕的決策。他們根本就沒有考慮過要保留這些電子郵件，儘管法律規定他們有必要這樣做。”

華盛頓公民責任與道德組織的執行主管梅勒妮•斯隆說：“我們也許永遠都無法瞭解事情的全部真相。似乎他們根本就不想保留這些郵件。”

斯隆稱，最新發現的遺失郵件“讓我們明確了一點，那就是布什政府說了謊，他們聲稱沒有遺失任何郵件”。

Vocabulary:

tally：a record of the number or amount of something, especially one that you can keep adding to（總數）

subpoena：a writ requiring appearance in court to give testimony（傳票，法庭傳召令）