Sanders suspends additional staffers for accessing Clinton data files

Bernie Sanders speaks to reporters in the media filing center after a Democratic presidential primary debate Saturday, Dec. 19, 2015, at Saint Anselm College in Manchester, N.H. (Photo: Michael Dwyer/AP)

MANCHESTER, N.H. — Two more staffers from the presidential campaign of Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Vermont independent, have been suspended after revelations that members of his team improperly accessed data belonging to the campaign of their top rival in the Democratic primary, Hillary Clinton.

Sanders’ campaign manager, Jeff Weaver, announced the suspensions while speaking to reporters in the spin room after the Democratic presidential debate at Saint Anselm College in Manchester on Saturday night. He said the campaign made the decision after reviewing audit logs that showed members of the Sanders team had accessed Clinton’s data. The Sanders campaign is having an independent firm investigate the incident.

“We felt it was important with the new information that we had to suspend a couple of other employees while we finished our investigation,” Weaver said.

Sanders campaign staffers were able to access Clinton’s data because of an issue with software provided to the Democratic National Committee by a third- party vendor, NGP VAN. The DNC maintains a file of voter information that is shared by all of the Democratic campaigns.

Weaver said the two suspended staffers are still being paid by the Sanders campaign. He declined to reveal their names, pending the results of the investigation into the incident.

“They are to stay away from the campaign and not to contact campaign employees until the investigation is complete,” Weaver said.

The Sanders campaign had previously announced the firing of its national data director, Josh Uretsky, over the incident. Uretsky has claimed that neither he nor his colleagues were involved in any wrongdoing and has said they were merely trying to analyze the scope of the security issue in the software.

Yahoo News also talked with Clinton campaign spokesman Brian Fallon about the suspensions. Fallon praised the Sanders campaign for its response, which included a personal apology from Sanders to Clinton during the debate.

“We were very pleased tonight that Sen. Sanders apologized. As you heard, Hillary Clinton graciously accepted that apology,” Fallon said. “It is encouraging to see that they’re taking further steps consistent with the tone that Sen. Sanders struck tonight,” he added when informed of the suspensions.

According to Weaver, the Sanders campaign was only provided with the audit logs by the DNC and NGP VAN on Saturday. Weaver expressed his frustration at this delay, given that the Clinton campaign had had access to the logs earlier.

“It was only provided today,” Weaver said of the logs. “I don’t quite understand why that is.”

In a statement released to reporters on Friday, the Clinton campaign said the logs showed that its data had been accessed by “four different accounts” belonging to the Sanders campaign. It announced in a statement that the logs showed that these four accounts had conducted 25 searches and saved the data in “the Sanders campaign account.” In a conference call on Friday, top Clinton aides said the data accessed by Sanders’ team included information about the voters they are targeting and the number of supporters they expect to turn out in key primary states. Clinton campaign spokespeople also provided reporters with copies of the logs on Friday.

As a result of the data breach, the DNC initially cut the Sanders campaign off from access to the shared voter file. The Sanders campaign described this as an overreaction and suggested that it was part of an effort by the party organization to aid Clinton, who is currently the overwhelming frontrunner in the Democratic primary. After the Sanders campaign filed an injunction in federal court, it reached an agreement with the DNC to launch the independent investigation and to restore its access to the shared voter file.

In the spin room, Weaver strongly implied that the fact the audit logs were not given to the Sanders campaign earlier was further evidence that the DNC was not acting in good faith.

“You can make your own assumptions about that, but I know it was being dished out to you in media hits, when it should have been given to us so that we could do our investigation,” Weaver said.

Fallon, the Clinton spokesman, confirmed to Yahoo News that the audit logs were provided to the Clinton campaign by NGP VAN.

Along with its complaints about the handling of the data breach, the Sanders campaign has also suggested that the fact that several of the Democratic debates are being held on weekends is evidence that the DNC is attempting to protect Clinton’s frontrunner status. Television viewership is generally far lower on weekends.

In the spin room before Weaver announced the two suspensions, Yahoo News asked Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta about the allegations that the DNC has unfairly aided his team.

“There’s nothing to it,” Podesta declared.

Podesta argued that it was the decision of the networks broadcasting the debates that determined when they are being held.

“We would have liked to have everybody see this debate,” Podesta said, adding, “She was terrific tonight.”

DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz also told Yahoo News that it was the networks that decided on the schedule for the debates. Washerman Schultz pointed out that three Democratic debates in this election cycle were scheduled during the week and three were planned for weekends.

“The broadcast networks simply don’t have as flexible a programming schedule as the cable networks do,” Wasserman Schultz said. “We certainly didn’t say, ‘Hey, please schedule our debate on a Saturday.’ … That’s how it worked out, programming-wise.”

The Sanders campaign has said it was not consulted about the debate schedule or on which networks they would be broadcast.

Wasserman Schultz dismissed the Sanders’ campaign’s claims that the DNC has tried to help Clinton as “sticks and stones.”

“You know, as party chair, you get a lot of bumps and bruises. They probably don’t want to punch hard in other directions, so the party chair is an easy target,” Wasserman Schultz said. “I’m just working hard to try to make sure that we can get ready to launch our nominee to the White House, and I’m looking forward to continuing to do that.”