The FBI on Sunday lifted the threat that Hillary Clinton might face charges over her private email server -- dropping a campaign bombshell 36 hours before her White House showdown with Donald Trump. The Democrat's camp welcomed the news that FBI Director James Comey had decided not to change his July recommendation that she not be prosecuted for putting US secrets at risk while serving as secretary of state.
But, as both candidates criss-crossed swing states in a last desperate scramble before Tuesday's election, the 11th-hour decision by the Federal Bureau of Investigation refocused attention on an issue that has dogged Clinton's bid. "We're glad that this matter is resolved," her campaign director Jennifer Palmieri told reporters aboard the 69-year-old's plane. Trump's camp reacted with bitter annoyance.
Campaign manager Kellyanne Conway told Fox News that Comey's letter "doesn't change anything" and argued the FBI probe "was mishandled from the beginning." Late last month, with Clinton seemingly on a glide path to victory, Comey sent shockwaves through both campaigns by announcing a renewed FBI investigation in Clinton's email use.
In July, the Justice Department, acting on the FBI's recommendation, decided not to prosecute Clinton over her use of a private server for official emails while she was Washington's top diplomat. But, after a previously undiscovered batch of mails was found on a laptop belonging to the husband of one of Clinton's key aides, Comey warned lawmakers he was revisiting the case. Trump, the 70-year-old property tycoon and Republican flag-bearer, seized on the opening, condemning Clinton's "criminal scheme" and arguing that she was unfit to be president.
Opinion polls tightened as Trump began to recover ground he lost after several women accused him of sexual assault, and the race looked headed for a photo finish. But on Sunday, Comey wrote another letter to Congress to say that FBI agents had been working around the clock to review the "large volume of emails" found on the laptop.
"During that process, we reviewed all of the communications that were to or from Hillary Clinton while she was secretary of state," Comey wrote. "Based on our review, we have not changed our conclusions that we expressed in July with respect to Hillary Clinton," he concluded. Leading Trump supporter and former House speaker Newt Gingrich expressed his exasperation on Twitter. "Comey must be under enormous political pressure to cave like this and announce something he can't possibly know," he declared.
- 'She's protected' -
Clinton made no direct reference to her reprieve in her first campaign stop -- in Cleveland, Ohio -- after the news broke. Instead, she hammered her opponent over his sometimes-ugly rhetoric and, implicitly, the alleged covert Russian interference that have poisoned the race. "There are powerful forces inside and outside of America that do threaten to pull us apart," she said. "We've arrived at a moment of reckoning in this election. Our core values as Americans are being tested." It was not immediately clear how the news would affect what has been one of the most bruising campaigns in modern US history, one that has the world on tenterhooks. But there was relief among Clinton aides as they planned a huge rally in Philadelphia on Monday, the night before Election Day, starring President Barack Obama, his wife Michelle and Bruce Springsteen. Trump, who has hammered away at the email issue in stump speeches three to four times a day for the last few weeks of the campaign, had no immediate reaction to Comey's decision.
