President Obama said Saturday that he's "glad" Hillary Clinton has asked the State Department to publicly release emails she sent during her time as secretary of state.
In the interview with CBS News, the president said he first learned about Clinton's use of a personal email address to conduct official business the "same time everybody else learned it through news reports."
Asked if he was "disappointed" by Clinton's decision, Obama responded, "Let me just say that Hillary Clinton is and has been an outstanding public servant. She was a great Secretary of State for me."
"The policy of my administration is to encourage transparency," he continued, "which is why my emails — the Blackberry I carry around – all those records are available and archived, and I'm glad that Hillary's instructed that those emails about official business need to be disclosed."
Obama has said in the past that, for security reasons, only 10 people have his personal email address.
On Monday, the New York Times reported that Clinton never used a State-issued email address during her time as secretary, instead using a personal email address. Last year, some State officials became aware of the lack of a State Department email address during a review of Benghazi-related documents, the Times reported later in the week.
Clinton's aides sent approximately 55,000 pages of email from her personal account to the State Department in December; those pages were the product of a review process conducted by Clinton staff, and an undisclosed amount of emails from Clinton's personal account remain private.
Following Clinton's request that those 55,000 pages of email be publicly released, State Department officials have said they will conduct an official review of those emails to determine which can be released.