Trump vs. Clinton election updates: Donald pounces on Hillary’s email woes
Published 1:28 pm Saturday, October 29, 2016
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Latest on the 2016 presidential campaign (all times EDT):
2 p.m.
Donald Trump supporters at a Colorado rally are cheering about Hillary Clinton’s email woes.
Trump told a crowd in Golden, Colorado, on Saturday that the FBI’s review of Clinton email practices raises “everybody’s deepest hope that justice, as last, can be properly delivered.”
He’s taken to calling the matter the biggest political scandal since Watergate.
Scrutiny of Clinton’s email practices came back to the fore when FBI Director James Comey told Congress on Friday that newly discovered emails are pertinent to the case.
The emails in question were on a device belonging to Anthony Weiner, the disgraced former New York congressman who is separated from longtime Clinton aide Huma Abedin. Comey gave few details, and no indication that the new trove would change the FBI’s decision in the summer not to prosecute Clinton for what he called her reckless handling of sensitive emails as secretary of state.
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1:20 p.m.
Hillary Clinton’s campaign is lashing out at the FBI. The campaign says there’s no indication that a cache of recently discovered emails being reviewed by the agency is even about her.
Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta says FBI Director James Comey’s information is “long on innuendo” and “short on facts.” He says there’s “no evidence of wrongdoing. No charge of wrongdoing. No indication this is even about Hillary.”
On that latter point, though, Comey in fact says the newly discovered emails do appear “pertinent” to the Clinton email investigation.
Podesta and campaign manager Robby Mook are calling on the FBI to release more details involving the inquiry of emails on a device belonging to Anthony Weiner, the disgraced former New York congressman who is separated from longtime Clinton aide Huma Abedin.
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12:30 p.m.
A government official tells The Associated Press that the Justice Department had advised the FBI against telling Congress about new developments in the Hillary Clinton email investigation because of the potential fallout so close to the election.
The FBI says it recently came upon new emails possibly pertinent to that investigation. Director James Comey said in a letter to Congress that the FBI discovered the emails while pursuing an unrelated case and would review whether they were classified.
The government official says the Justice Department concluded the letter would be inconsistent with department policy that directs against investigative actions that could be seen as affecting an election or helping a particular candidate.
The official says Comey made the decision to go ahead with the letter independently of the Justice Department.
The official wasn’t authorized to discuss the department’s internal deliberations publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
—Associated Press writer Eric Tucker.