More Trouble For Hillary? FBI Director Hints At Probe Into Clinton Foundation
A divided House Benghazi committee has approved a report into the deadly 2012 attacks in Libya – and signaled the investigation of Hillary Clinton may continue.
The FBI’s finding that Clinton sent and received classified emails on a private email server demolished months of public assurances by the former secretary of state that she had done no such thing. The final vote was split 7-4 along party lines.
But Comey said that the FBI investigative team could not find evidence going through thousands of Clinton’s emails that she “clearly, willfully” sought to violate USA laws and that “no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case” against her based on the evidence uncovered during the probe.
“Our committee’s work is done”, Chairman Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) told reporters after the roughly hourlong meeting, which went on behind closed doors and was interrupted by a 40-minute lockdown of the Capitol.
Pressed by Chaffetz Thursday on whether Clinton lied, FBI Director James Comey said during a hearing that he had not reviewed Clinton’s testimony because it had not been referred to him by Congress. Chaffetz assured Comey he would soon get a referral.
Comey also said that Clinton used multiple devices for sending and receiving classified emails.
“I have said, and I repeat, that it was a mistake to use personal email”, she added. “I am concerned”, he said.
After maintaining for more than a year that she did not send or receive classified information through her unauthorised private email server, Mrs Clinton acknowledged she may have at least unwittingly done so, three days after the Federal Bureau of Investigation concluded this happened at least 110 times.
The State Department said the markings on the emails were placed in error and “were no longer necessary or appropriate”.
Meanwhile, the US State Department has reopened an internal investigation of possible mishandling of classified information by Mrs Clinton and senior aides.
The State Department suspended its review in April to avoid interfering with the FBI’s inquiry.
Under an onslaught of Republican criticism, Comey vigorously defended the government’s decision and rejected GOP accusations that the presidential candidate was given special treatment.
“The Republicans are addicted to Benghazi”, Cummings said.
But Clinton yesterday brushed aside the rebuke from Comey in several other interviews.
“There is simply no excuse for Hillary Clinton’s decision to set up a home-cooked email system which left sensitive and classified national security information vulnerable to theft and exploitation by America’s enemies”, the letter said.