TIMES WATCHDOG: New emails provide a fuller look into the former secretary of state’s advocacy for Boeing.

The company helped her reach a major foreign-policy goal, gave over $1 million to the Clinton Foundation and sponsored speeches that paid former President Clinton six-figure sums.

In 2012, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton greeted Boeing CEO Jim McNerney during the first-ever State Department Global Business Conference. (Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP)

 As a senator and later secretary of state, Hillary Clinton closely followed the bidding for the U.S. Air Force’s massive $35 billion tanker-refueling contract — a contentious process that pitted Boeing against Airbus, as well as the state of Washington against Alabama.

In February 2011, a staffer at the State Department emailed Secretary Clinton’s private address with unexpected good news: “Boeing won the contract.”

“I’m pleased,” she replied.

Among recent secretaries of state, Hillary Clinton was perhaps the most aggressive booster for big American companies overseas, particularly for Boeing, Washington’s largest private employer.

So appreciative of her sales efforts, Boeing’s then-president and CEO Jim McNerney once turned to her on stage at a government-business conference and lauded her department for advocating like no other in the past two decades: “It’s like back to the late ’80s and early ’90s all over again.”

As the unruly presidential campaign unfolds and as Washington voters prepare for Saturday’s Democratic caucuses, Clinton’s ties to Boeing have resurfaced again.

Democratic presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders, who campaigned in Seattle on Sunday, criticized her at a recent debate for supporting “corporate welfare” for Boeing and other giant companies. And while Clinton’s work on behalf of Boeing has been explored in other news reports, recently disclosed messages from Clinton’s private email server give new insights into the symbiotic relationship and how much her department reveled in Boeing success.

During the periods when Secretary Clinton was pushing governments to sign deals with Boeing, the aerospace company provided financial support to help her achieve a major foreign-policy goal. Boeing also donated more than $1 million to the Clinton family’s global foundation set up by her husband, former President Clinton, and sponsored speeches that paid him six-figure sums.

On Tuesday, Clinton will begin her Washington state campaign swing by meeting with Boeing machinists in Everett. The former president of the International Association of Machinists,Tom Buffenbarger, left the job in January and said at the time he would campaign for Clinton and serve as a surrogate speaker.

The Clinton campaign did not make anyone available over the past few days to speak about her relationship with Boeing. In a statement, campaign spokeswoman Stephanie Formas said Clinton “proudly and loudly advocated on behalf of American businesses and workers and took every opportunity to promote U.S. economic interests abroad.”

Read the rest at Seattle Times.