All is well, he apologized. Update to this story.
Via WaPo:
The director of the Secret Service has contradicted statements he made to a top government investigator examining his agency’s disclosure of unflattering information about a congressman, saying he now recalls more about the matter, according to two government officials briefed on the probe.
Director Joseph P. Clancy this week alerted investigators from the Department of Homeland Security that he was revising his account, the officials said. Clancy says he now remembers details of the incident, which involved agency personnel circulating information from its files that Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), an outspoken critic of the service, had once applied for a job at the agency and was turned down.
During a highly publicized inquiry by the DHS inspector general, Clancy told investigators that he was unaware of the information about Chaffetz until being informed April 1 that The Washington Post planned to publish an article about the matter, according to the report by Inspector General John Roth. Clancy also told investigators that he had been unaware that his staff was circulating the information internally, in violation of federal privacy law.
Roth’s report, released Wednesday, found that 45 agents and supervisors had peeked at Chaffetz’s personnel file, which was stored in an internal Secret Service database. The report said 18 supervisors, including the deputy director and Clancy’s chief of staff, knew that the information had been accessed inside the agency. But the report said Clancy was a notable exception and had never been informed.
Clancy now says he knew that the unflattering information was being shared inside his agency and was told about it by a top deputy before it was leaked to the news media, officials said.
As a result of his new statements, investigators from Roth’s office plan to reinterview Clancy about his revised account, the officials said.
In a statement to The Post, Clancy said Thursday that after the IG report was released this week, he recalled becoming aware on March 25 of a “speculative rumor” that Chaffetz had applied to the service and had been rejected. Clancy said he considered it at the time to be “not credible” and “not indicative” of any inappropriate action by employees.
“It was not until later that I became aware that this rumor had developed as Agency employees had used an Agency database to gain access to this information,” Clancy said in the statement. “I feel it is extremely important to be as accurate as possible regarding my knowledge of this matter and I have personally spoken to Chairman Chaffetz to advise him of the additional information that I provided to the Inspector General.”