Alaska Set To Release Thousands Of Palin Emails

By Eyder Peralta

Published June 1, 2011 at 1:22 PM EDT

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin greets some of the thousands of motorcycle enthusiasts and military veterans participating in the Rolling Thunder rally on Sunday.

In response to Freedom of Information Act requests dating back to the 2008 presidential elections, Alaska is set to release more than 24,000 pages of emails sent and received by Sarah Palin during her governorship. The Anchorage Daily News reports that 2,415 pages are exempt from the request and that:

It remains to be seen how many of the released emails are going to be at least partially blacked out. State lawyers reviewed printouts of each email and suggested which emails — or which portions of emails — to withhold. Gov. Sean Parnell's office made the final decisions.

MSNBC reports the e-mails should be ready by June 10. The state, reports MSNBC, had at first said it would cost as much as $15 million for the records, but the Daily News says individuals and news organizations that requested the records will pay $725.97 in copying fees.

Part of the reason it's taken so long for Alaska to retrieve and make email records public is because the former Alaska governor sent and received official email using a Yahoo account. The Daily News reports:

Technicians searched for those records by sifting through email accounts of more than 50 state employees, including Cabinet members, executive staff and close aides, to look for emails Palin sent or received from her personal account.