State Department finally admitted today what the rest of us already knew - they deliberately deleted video showing them fessing up to lying to the press.

Transparency!

State Department admits briefing footage on Iran deal intentionally deleted | Fox News

The State Department, in a stunning admission, acknowledged Wednesday that an official intentionally deleted several minutes of video footage from a 2013 press briefing, where a top spokeswoman seemed to acknowledge misleading the press over the Iran nuclear deal.

“There was a deliberate request [to delete the footage] – this wasn’t a technical glitch,” State Department spokesman John Kirby said Wednesday, in admitting that an unidentified official had a video editor “excise” the segment.

The State Department had faced questions earlier this year over the block of missing tape from a December 2013 briefing. At that briefing, then-spokeswoman Jen Psaki was asked by Fox News’ James Rosen about an earlier claim that no direct, secret talks were underway between the U.S. and Iran – when, in fact, they were.

Psaki at the time seemed to admit the discrepancy, saying: “There are times where diplomacy needs privacy in order to progress. This is a good example of that.”

However, Fox News later discovered the Psaki exchange was missing from the department’s official website and its YouTube channel. Eight minutes from the briefing, including the comments on the Iran deal, were edited out and replaced with a white-flash effect.

Officials initially suggested a "glitch" occurred.

But on Wednesday, current State Department spokesman Kirby said someone had censored the video intentionally. He said he couldn't find out who was responsible, but described such action as unacceptable.

While saying there were “no rules [or] regulations in place that prohibited” this at the time, Kirby said: "Deliberately removing a portion of the video was not and is not in keeping with the State Department's commitment to transparency and public accountability.”

Kirby said he learned that on the same day of the 2013 briefing, a video editor received a call from a State Department public affairs official who made "a specific request ... to excise that portion of the briefing."

Kirby says he has since ordered the original video restored on all platforms and asked the State Department's legal adviser to examine the matter. He said no further investigation will be made, primarily because no rules were in place against such actions.

Kirby said he has ordered new rules created to prevent a recurrence.

In a statement issued late Wednesday aftrnoon, Psaki, now White House Communications Director, said, "I had no knowledge of nor would I have approved of any form of editing or cutting my briefing transcript on any subject while at the State Department."

The Psaki footage took on new significance last month on the heels of a New York Times Magazine profile of Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes, who boasted of creating an “echo chamber” to sell the Iran deal.

Rhodes later claimed they did not mislead the public and “confirmed publicly” there were “discreet channels of communication established with Iran in 2012.”

Yet in a February 2013 briefing, then-State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland claimed there were no secret, direct talks with Iran at the time. It was Psaki’s explanation of that briefing, months later in December, that was later scrubbed from the footage archives.

Fox News’ James Rosen and Lucas Tomlinson and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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John Kirby was stuck in an uncomfortable position covering for the tape deleters and who ordered it done. I wonder if the request came from the WH.

Probably. When you are the King, anything is within your power.

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We are advised to NOT judge ALL Muslims by the actions of a few lunatics, but we are encouraged to judge ALL gun owners by the actions of a few lunatics.

... and the significance that "an official intentionally deleted several minutes of video footage from a 2013 press briefing" is.....

Absolutely nothing.

It related to a secret dialogue between the US and Iran that wouldn't have been secret if the information remained in the released footage. The deletion actually makes sense from a national security standpoint.

Of course national security doesn't matter to the rabid Republicans if they can use it's exposure to bitch-slap the Obama White House.

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"I always had a rule, if a restaurant is dirty on the outside, it's dirty on the inside." Donald Trump

"I always had a rule, if the White House is dirty on the inside, it's dirty on the outside." ShivaTD

Based upon the corruption, brutality, inhumanity, immorality, dishonesty, and incompetence of the Trump administration the White House is the dirtiest house in America and there's no known cleanser that with remove the stains of the Trump Administration.

I guess the significance would be that a simple phone call from an unidentified source to an unidentified technician purposely and easily altered portion of public record for an unidentified reason. I guess the insignificant decision to do the editing may have more to do with crafting a narrative than national security. Maybe we should accept that Gov. agencies and their Public Affairs employees operate by different rules. Why complain about something that we already know is the case? What's wrong with a little propaganda?