Vice President Mike Pence is demanding an apology.
Mark Paoletta, the vice president's counsel, wrote Associated Press president and CEO Gary Pruitt a scathing letter Saturday demanding an apology after an AP journalist published the personal email address of second lady Karen Pence on Friday, which led to "vitriolic and malicious emails" directed at the second lady.
"Last night the @AP published my wife's private email address, violating her privacy and our security," Pence tweeted from his official vice president's Twitter account Saturday afternoon.
"When we requested they take it down, they refused. The @AP owes my wife an apology," he added, attaching a copy of Paoletta's letter.
The full letter read:
I am writing to express grave concerns about the Associated Press recklessly and irresponsibly publishing the private e-mail address of Mrs. Karen Pence in an article dated March 3, 2017. The publication of Mrs. Pence's active private email address to millions of your readers has subjected her to vitriolic and malicious emails and raise serious security concerns. There was absolutely no reason to publish this private email address, and you should be ashamed of your reprehensible conduct.
When the Vice President's Press Secretary learned of the publication, he called the reporter only to learn the reporter seemed surprised the account was still active. The Associated Press should have done a proper inquiry into the status of Mrs. Pence's personal e-mail account before publishing it. I am unaware of the press publishing the private email account of any previous Second Lady, who is not, as you are well aware, an elected official.
The Vice President's Press Secretary also reached out to the Indianapolis AP Bureau and finally to the Washington AP Bureau. Your organization was unwilling to retract the story, issue a correction, or even redact the e-mail from the story.
Your organization should apologize to Mrs. Pence for violating her privacy, and the Associated Press should observe the basic tenets of fairness, decency, and journalistic integrity in covering the Vice President, Mrs. Pence and their family in the future.
Pence has been the subject of scrutiny this week after it was revealed via the Indianapolis Star and the AP that he used a private email address during his time as governor of Indiana to conduct some public business. So far, only 29 pages of emails have been publicly released.
To note, the Pences' personal email addressed were published by the AP in a story titled, "Pence fought against releasing records as Indiana governor."
