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street view of the Jacob K. Javits Federal Building taken on November 4, 2016,
where the FBI's field office is located. Drew Angerer/Getty Images
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The Federal Bureau of
Investigations has completed its review of a new batch of emails related to
Hillary Clinton’s private email server, and is still not recommending charges
against her, according to a letter written by director James Comey and sent to
members of Congress.
WIRED
report continues:
This
new letter comes just over a week after Comey alerted the House Judiciary Committee that the FBI was
looking into more emails, reportedly found on Anthony Weiner’s computer during
an investigation into his sexting scandal. Because Weiner’s estranged wife Huma
Abedin is Clinton’s top aide, some of those emails were written to and from
Clinton.
That
letter, vague in its description, set off more than a week of speculation and
assumptions about what the emails contained—even as millions of voters cast
early ballots in swing states that could decide the election. The Clinton
campaign—and intelligence officials on both sides of the aisle—condemned Comey
for leaving so much to voters’ imaginations with just 11 days to go before the
election. It was a somewhat unprecedented move for Comey, considering government
officials aren’t supposed to do anything that could influence the
results of an election.
But
according to Comey’s new letter, the FBI has reviewed all of those
communications and has reached the same conclusion. As Comey put it in July, while Clinton may have been “extremely
careless” in setting up her own server, it doesn’t warrant criminal charges.
Clinton’s
emails have dominated the public conversation since last March when the news
was first reported. At rallies across the country, Donald Trump
supporters call for her to be locked up for her supposed misdeeds. But the
FBI’s conclusion, now reiterated twice over, seems to indicate that the chief
scandal that has plagued Clinton’s campaign and has eroded trust among voters,
well, just hasn’t amounted to much. And yet, according to The Tyndall Report,
which studies news broadcasts, the three major news networks have devoted about
three times as much nightly news coverage to
Clinton’s emails as they have to all issue-related
coverage.
The
Clinton campaign has yet to release a formal statement, but Clinton’s press
secretary Brian Fallon tweeted his reaction:
While
the Clinton camp is likely relieved the investigation isn’t dragging on into
Tuesday, Comey’s initial letter may have already done damage. Early voting has
already been underway in some crucial swing states. More than 2.5 million
people have already voted in North Carolina. Another 5.25 million plus have
cast a vote in the make or break state of Florida. More than 360,000 voters in
Nevada cast in-person ballots between the release of Comey’s first letter and
now, according to state election officials. About 23,000 people sent in
absentee ballots there, too. And Colorado voters have returned more than 1.5
million ballots as of Friday.
Meanwhile,
though polls have continued to show Clinton ahead, the blog FiveThirtyEight has downgraded her chances of clinching the presidency
from 81.5 percent on October 28, the day Comey released his initial letter, to
64.9 percent today.
It
initially seemed that the FBI’s investigation wouldn’t be completed before
Election Day, and it’s unclear how the bureau managed to speed through the
review. It’s possible that the bulk of the emails were duplicates, which had
already been reviewed after Clinton turned over her trove of emails. The
Department of Justice said in a statement, “The Department of Justice and the FBI
dedicated all necessary resources to conduct this review expeditiously.” The
FBI didn’t respond to WIRED’s request for comment.
As
for the Trump campaign, it seems the Republican nominee was unaware of the new
Comey letter when he spoke to voters in Minnesota this afternoon.
The
Republican National Committee, however, continues to cast Clinton’s use of the
private server in a sinister light. In a statement following Comey’s letter,
RNC chairman Reince Preibus wrote, that the FBI’s findings “were a damning and
unprecedented indictment of her judgment.”
On Tuesday, we’ll see what
voters have to say.
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