The Clinton Foundation had a direct line to Hillary Clinton’s former chief of staff at the State Department, seeking her advice on lucrative speaking invitations for former President Bill Clinton outside of the department’s normal ethics process, according to emails that surfaced in a federal lawsuit.

Foundation officials sought guidance from Cheryl Mills, a longtime Clinton lawyer and friend, on whether the former president should accept paid speaking gigs in countries that could have presented public relations problems, including a North Korea appearance that the nonprofit said Hillary Clinton’s brother was pushing, the emails show.

Mills sat on the foundation’s board before becoming the department’s No. 2 official and returned to the board after leaving State in 2013.

The emails, unearthed in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by the conservative group Citizens United, offer a fuller picture of the agency’s dialogue with foundation officials about whether paid speaking appearances — particularly in foreign countries — by former President Clinton would pose ethical issues for his wife, the nation’s top diplomat. State Department ethics officials reviewed hundreds of speaking requests for Bill Clinton submitted by the foundation and rejected only a few of them.

Read the article “Clinton’s Chief of Staff Gave Advice to Clinton Foundation” on politico.com.