Eric Holder’s email alias as attorney general was ‘Lew Alcindor’
How big a fan of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder? Big enough to adopt the birth name of the NBA’s all-time leading scorer as his email alias during his time in the cabinet, according to Jason Leopold of VICE News:
[…] Holder used Abdul-Jabbar’s birth name, Lew Alcindor, as an alias for his official Department of Justice (DOJ) email account, raising more questions about the email practices of top Obama administration officials, and about the ability of US government agencies to track down correspondence in response to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests.
The Lew Alcindor revelation was made in a February 16 letter that DOJ sent to VICE News and Ryan Shapiro, a historian and doctoral candidate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who specializes in national security research.
“For your information,” the letter said, “e-mails in the enclosed documents which use the account name ‘Lew Alcindor’ denote e-mails to or from former Attorney General Holder.”
The pseudonym shoutout — initiated in order to prevent Holder from receiving reams of spam messages and emails from the general public, according to former Holder spokesman Brian Fallon — is far from the only tether between Holder and Abdul-Jabbar.
In 2011, after President Barack Obama had feted Abdul-Jabbar at a White House reception, Holder awarded him the Abraham Lincoln Medal — an annual honor given to someone who, “through their body of work, accomplishments or personal attributes, [exemplifies] the lasting legacy, and mettle of character embodied by the most beloved President in our Nation’s history, President Abraham Lincoln.” In a 2015 feature for the Washington Post, Geoff Edgers recounted Abdul-Jabbar interviewing Holder for a documentary he was producing on race:
That morning, as the cameras roll, he and Holder talk fluently about voting rights, hate crimes and the Supreme Court. It’s only when the interview ends that the scene shifts into something more familiar.
Staffers stream into the room, clutching iPhones. They gather, in shifts, for photos around the iconic star. Deborah Morales, Abdul-Jabbar’s manager and the key adviser in promoting his public voice, hands Holder a signed glossy showing the master shooting a patented skyhook over the hated Boston Celtics. By now, elbow room is at a premium.
“He’s the AG’s hero, and he revolutionized the sport,” says Margaret Richardson, Holder’s chief of staff, smiling as she watches the scrum.
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The month before Edgers’ feature saw print, Holder told Esquire something he picked up from the former Milwaukee Bucks and Los Angeles Lakers legend as a kid: “I grew up in New York in the sixties and seventies, and I remember reading Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s autobiography. He said one of the things you always wanted to do was keep your cool. That was something to be valued.” He also told Politico that Abdul-Jabbar “was one of [his] idols” growing up and has since “become a friend.”
Around the same time, Holder also invoked the Hall of Famer when discussing how his own game compares to that of the famously roundball-loving Commander in Chief, according to Catalina Camia of USA TODAY:
“I’m from New York City, the home of basketball players like Nate ‘Tiny’ Archibald, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Julius ‘The Doctor’ Erving, Connie Hawkins, you know, Chris Mullin. The president is from Hawaii,” Holder said, drawing a few laughs. […]
“Now, I’m just saying that his background, he’s a good ballplayer. He’s got a real good left hand. He has the ability to drive. He’s 10 years younger than I am. He’s in better shape, he’s still my boss.”
Holder, however, isn’t shy about boasting he’s still got game. He instructed the National Press Club audience to search YouTube for his name and basketball to check out a “sweet jumper.”
Charming as those interactions and references are, though, some have raised concerns about whether Holder’s use of aliases in his Department of Justice email accounts during his years as Attorney General — like Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton’s use of a private home-based email server to conduct official business during her time as Secretary of State — “could frustrate federal efforts at transparency and effective recordkeeping,” according to Julian Hattem of The Hill.
According to VICE, “Holder’s name does not appear anywhere in his Lew Alcindor email account,” which some watchdog organizations worry increases the likelihood that some correspondence could fall through the cracks in the event of a future public-records request:
In a Q&A with the Washington Post shortly thereafter, [the the National Archives and Records Administration’s] chief records officer, Paul Wester Jr., said that while there is no prohibition against using email aliases, the practice makes it difficult to locate and turn over records in response to FOIA requests, and NARA does not condone it. […]
Anne Weismann, the executive director of good government group Campaign for Accountability, and an expert on FOIA, told VICE News that even though the DOJ has acknowledged that Holder used an email alias, and that DOJ’s FOIA staff is aware, “it still raises a question about whether the agency is properly documenting its work and preserving records under the Federal Records Act.”
“Will members of the public reviewing the records of Eric Holder’s tenure as [attorney general] understand emails purporting to be from ‘Lew Alcindor’ are actually from him?” Weismann said. “An investigation clearly is warranted.”
Abdul-Jabbar, for his part, declined comment on Holder’s now-controversial tribute.
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Dan Devine is an editor for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
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