Its not a matter of what is true that counts but a matter of what is perceived
to be true." --Henry Kissinger
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From Bob Franken
CNN Washington Bureau
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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The White House is being accused of improperly trying to hide e-mails about government business by using unofficial e-mail accounts.
Congressional investigators say they found communications on one account from top White House aides about official matters, like the December firings of eight U.S. attorneys.
Those e-mails were discovered on a Republican National Committee e-mail domain called gwb43.com. That domain is not part of the official White House communication system.
The Presidential Records Act, passed during the Nixon administration, requires the preservation of all official records of and about the president.
A White House spokesman defended the use of outside e-mail accounts as an appropriate method of separating official business from political campaign work.
But the use of those accounts by officials discussing the firings -- and one from now-imprisoned lobbyist Jack Abramoff -- have led a liberal watchdog group to accuse administration of trying to skirt the law governing preservation of presidential records.
"They wanted to make sure that no record could ever be found of what they were really up to in the White House," Melanie Sloan, executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, told CNN.
Rep. Henry Waxman, the chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, has sent letters to the RNC and the former head of the Bush-Cheney re-election campaign, arguing that outside e-mails are subject to the act.
In March, Waxman notified those groups that congressional investigators "have uncovered evidence that White House staff have used non-governmental e-mail accounts to conduct official government business," and called on them to preserve those records.
White House political advisers used the outside e-mails to discuss the December firings of federal prosecutors in eight cities, a shake-up that has led to a firestorm on Capitol Hill, documents released amid the flap have shown.
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