FBI to review more emails related to Clinton’s private email use
The head of the FBI said on Friday the agency would investigate additional emails that have surfaced related to Hillary Clinton’s use of a personal email server to determine whether they contain classified information, adding that it is unclear how significant the new materials may be.
The FBI announced on Friday that the agency will review new evidence in the case pertaining to Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server when she was secretary of state.
In a letter to congressional leaders, FBI director James Comey said that in connection with an “unrelated case”, investigators “learned of the existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the Clinton investigation”.
“I agreed that the FBI should take appropriate investigative steps designed to allow investigators to review these emails to determine whether they contain classified information, as well as to assess their importance to our investigation,” he wrote.
But he cautioned that the FBI was not in a position to assess the significance of the new evidence yet or how long it would take to complete this “additional work”.
Read: Clinton email server broke government rules, watchdog finds
Donald Trump immediately pounced on the turn of events, seeing an opportunity to press the argument he’s long tried to make against Clinton: That she thinks she’s above the law and that she put U.S. security at risk by using her personal email.
The GOP nominee told cheering supporters at his first campaign rally of the day that he has “great respect” for the fact that the FBI and the Department of Justice are now “wiling to have the courage to right the horrible mistake that they made” in concluding the investigation earlier.
Trump said of Clinton, “We must not let her take her criminal scheme into the Oval Office. ... This is bigger than Watergate.”
Trump’s campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway, wrote on Twitter: “A great day in our campaign just got even better. FBI reviewing new emails in Clinton probe.”
The FBI had closed the investigation in July, saying Clinton had been “extremely careless” about using a private email server, but said it did not find enough to recommend her prosecution for it.
(With inputs from agencies)
Read: Clinton email files released by FBI, show she didn’t know ‘C’ meant confidential