Plan B Forum

FBI Says It Is Reopening Investigation Into Hillary Clinton’s Private Email

WASHINGTON ― The FBI announced on Friday that it is reopening its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s handling of sensitive government information.

In a letter to members of Congress, FBI Director James Comey said the FBI, “in connection to an unrelated case” had learned of email that “appear to be pertinent to the investigation.”



In July, Comey announced the FBI would not recommend criminal charges against the former secretary of state but called the handling of sensitive information “extremely careless.”

House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), who has pledged to continue holding hearings into Clinton’s use of a private server while she was in the State Department, tweeted about the case being reopened.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/fbi ... 0edc30cb36

It took the nomination of Donald Trump to make me unhappy about this...

No doubt Drumpf will take credit for it...

No doubt Drumpf will take credit for it...

Taking undeserved credit is pretty much what he does best; indeed, the only thing he does well. Remember when he invented the phrase "You're Fired"?

TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP....

comeycomeycomeycomey......

This is even spiffier :

New Emails in Clinton Case Came From Devices Once Used by Anthony Weiner

WASHINGTON — Newly discovered emails from Hillary Clinton’s private server were found after the F.B.I. seized electronic devices once shared by Anthony D. Weiner and his estranged wife, Huma Abedin, a top aide to Mrs. Clinton, federal law enforcement officials said Friday.

The F.B.I. is investigating illicit text messages that Mr. Weiner, a former Democratic congressman from New York, sent to a 15-year-old girl in North Carolina. The bureau told Congress on Friday that it had uncovered new emails related to the Clinton case — one federal official said they numbered in the thousands — potentially reigniting an issue that has weighed on the presidential campaign and offering a lifeline to Donald J. Trump less than two weeks before the election.

In a letter to Congress, the F.B.I. director, James B. Comey, said that emails had surfaced in an unrelated case, and that they “appear to be pertinent to the investigation.”

Mr. Comey said the F.B.I. was taking steps to “determine whether they contain classified information, as well as to assess their importance to our investigation.” He said he did not know how long it would take to review the emails, or whether the new information was significant.

More:

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/29/us/po ... .html?_r=0

just tear up your republican card, man....

it s over. it s not your party anymore.

the Elitist, Better Than You Party is being formed by Hillary and Co, as we speak....

EBTYP wants you!!!

I may even join the party if the riff raff of special interest flunkies can be routed from the party......

stranger things have happened...

...me, a republican...., hell hath frozen over.

Lord Jim wrote:This is even spiffier :

We are going to get four years of this . . . but it beats the alternative.

wesw wrote:just tear up your republican card, man....

it s over. it s not your party anymore.

the Elitist, Better Than You Party is being formed by Hillary and Co, as we speak....

EBTYP wants you!!!

I may even join the party if the riff raff of special interest flunkies can be routed from the party......

stranger things have happened...

...me, a republican...., hell hath frozen over.

You've thrown your trump card away?!

no, I got a sign and a shirt and a few bumper stickers early...., when I first donated.

now I just donate and do not take any of the souveniers, it s more efficient and effective , numbers wise, for our campaign.

oh yeah..., I got a hat at the trump rally in berlin, md. ,when I got my shirt, earlier too.....

5 facts to consider:

• 1. The emails did not come from her private server.
  2. The emails did not come from Hillary Clinton.
  3. The device the Emails were found on did not belong to Clinton.
  4. There were only 3 emails being checked.
  5. The Clinton campaign is already asking for transparency.

ETA: Re that last point:

um....

I m not sure that all of those facts are facts.

most of them seem to be spin..., we ll see......

And what is the hysterical Republican reaction to this, if not "spin"?

Okay, then; I agree: we'll see......

Comey must be a star....

....he just grabbed her right by the pussy.

I bet Obama and lynch are just livid.

wow.

Hillary gave a brief press appearance about this yesterday...

Frankly I was surprised; I had expected her campaign to release a statement, but I thought she personally would go into full duck and ignore mode...

At first she started out fine, calling for Comey to fully release everything related to this...

But she couldn't just leave it there. (Whenever it comes to the emails, she goes into Trump mode and just can't seem to realize when it's time to stop talking...)

First she blatantly lied yet again, saying (twice) that the Comey had sent the letter to "the Republicans" when the fact is that it was sent simultaneously to both the Chairmen and ranking members of all the relevant House and Senate committees. Her obvious intent was to try to imply something nefarious going on between Comey and congressional Republicans. (Her campaign later released a statement making the hilarious claim that she "mispoke" )

Then she took a couple of questions and in response referred to the reports confirmed by The New York Times and NBC News that the emails in question were discovered on a lap top used both by Huma and Carlos Danger as a "rumor". Then she completely skated a straight forward question about whether she had spoken to Abedin about this since the story broke. (It's inconceivable that she hasn't; the woman travels with her for crissakes)

It seems to me that Comey was in a complete damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you-don't situation. (A situation created by the failure to turn this information over to the FBI months ago, as should have been done) Deciding to make the notification before the election, he incurs wrath with accusations that he's the tool of the GOP. Had he waited he would have been the focus of wrath accusing him of being a tool of Lynch and Obama.

Given how vague and cryptic his letter is, it's entirely possible that there's nothing significant here, but the optics are terrible . As I said, this stuff should have been turned over to the FBI a long time ago. (I believe Huma will soon find herself lying in the street listening to the sound of the on-coming bus...)

And of course the absolute bottom line on this is that Hillary has absolutely no one but herself to blame for this whole situation because if she hadn't made the arrogant decision to use an unauthorized private server NONE of this would have happened. Period.

Unless this is somehow diffused by subsequent clarifications from Comey coming soon, the affect will undoubtedly be to cause a race that was already showing some signs of tightening to tighten further...

Hillary really needs Trump to come out with some more outrageous/stupid statements to turn the focus back to him. And if there's anyone out there with any more dirt to drop on The Donald that they were waiting to drop closer to the election, now would be a good time to drop it....

Clinton should drop to her knees and thank God for early voting, because that may be what winds up saving her (and the country's) bacon...

Don't disagree with a word, LJ.

Except maybe this, which is still a mystery to me. I cannot believe that Hillary was sitting contemplating her troubles as Secy of State, and in a lightbulb moment thought "I know, I'll get my own server from Best Buy and get the Geek Squad to put it in that little cupboard under the stairs that Bill keeps promising to paint." I think HRC like most of us can just about spell server. And did no-one notice when she sent out the 'reply all' e-mail which said 'Please stop using the secretary@state.gov address because I won't be checking it any more. From now on use theprettyone@hillnbill.com.'?

What is this 'spin' about the Democrat party as the party of elitists?

Nobody is more elitist than the Donald, who knows more about ISIS than the generals; who needs no information or advice from anyone, that he does not already have; who always has, is, makes, the best of everything.

snailgate

In an op-ed in the Sunday Oct.30 New York Times, Richard Painter, chief White House Ethics Lawyer in the Bush Administration from 2005-07, explains why he filed a complaint yesterday against FBI Director James Comey with the Office Of Special Counsel and the Office of Government Ethics:

• Did the F.B.I. Director Abuse His Power?
  By RICHARD W. PAINTER | OCT. 30, 2016
  
  The F.B.I. is currently investigating the hacking of Americans’ computers by foreign governments. Russia is a prime suspect.
  
  Imagine a possible connection between a candidate for president in the United States and the Russian computer hacking. Imagine the candidate has business dealings in Russia, and has publicly encouraged the Russians to hack the email of his opponent. It would not be surprising for the F.B.I. to include this candidate and his campaign staff in its confidential investigation of Russian computer hacking.
  
  But it would be highly improper, and an abuse of power, for the F.B.I. to conduct such an investigation in the public eye, particularly on the eve of the election. It would be an abuse of power for the director of the F.B.I., absent compelling circumstances, to notify members of Congress that the candidate was under investigation. It would be an abuse of power if F.B.I. agents went so far as to obtain a search warrant and raid the candidate’s office tower, hauling out boxes of documents and computers in front of television cameras.
  
  The F.B.I.’s job is to investigate, not to influence the outcome of an election.
  
  Such acts could also be prohibited under the Hatch Act, which bars the use of an official position to influence an election. That is why the F.B.I. presumably would keep those aspects of an investigation confidential until after the election. The usual penalty for a violation is termination of federal employment.
  
  That is why, on Saturday, I filed a complaint against the F.B.I. with the Office of Special Counsel, which investigates Hatch Act violations, and with the Office of Government Ethics. I spent much of my career working on government and lawyers’ ethics, including as the chief White House ethics lawyer for George W. Bush. I never thought that the F.B.I. could be dragged into a political circus surrounding one of its investigations. Until this week.
  
  (For the sake of full disclosure, in this election I have supported Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, John Kasich and Hillary Clinton for president, in that order.)
  
  On Friday, the director of the F.B.I., James B. Comey, sent members of Congress a letter about developments in the agency’s investigation of Mrs. Clinton’s emails, an investigation which supposedly was closed months ago. This letter, which was quickly posted on the internet, made highly unusual public statements about an F.B.I. investigation concerning a candidate in the election. The letter was sent in violation of a longstanding Justice Department policy of not discussing specifics about pending investigations with others, including members of Congress. According to some news reports, the letter was sent before the F.B.I. had even obtained the search warrant that it needed to look at the newly discovered emails. And it was sent days before the election, when many Americans are already voting.
  
  Violations of the Hatch Act and of government ethics rules on misuse of official positions are not permissible in any circumstances, including in the case of an executive branch official acting under pressure from politically motivated members of Congress. Violations are of even greater concern when the agency is the F.B.I.
  
  It is not clear whether Mr. Comey personally wanted to influence the outcome of the election, although his letter — which cast suspicion on Mrs. Clinton without revealing specifics — was concerning. Also concerning is the fact that Mr. Comey already made unusual public statements expressing his opinion about Mrs. Clinton’s actions, calling her handling of classified information “extremely careless,” when he announced this summer that the F.B.I. was concluding its investigation of her email without filing any charges.
  
  But an official doesn’t need to have a specific intent — or desire — to influence an election to be in violation of the Hatch Act or government ethics rules. The rules are violated if it is obvious that the official’s actions could influence the election, there is no other good reason for taking those actions, and the official is acting under pressure from persons who obviously do want to influence the election.
  
  Absent extraordinary circumstances that might justify it, a public communication about a pending F.B.I. investigation involving a candidate that is made on the eve of an election is thus very likely to be a violation of the Hatch Act and a misuse of an official position. Serious questions also arise under lawyers’ professional conduct rules that require prosecutors to avoid excessive publicity and unnecessary statements that could cause public condemnation even of people who have been accused of a crime, not to mention people like Mrs. Clinton, who have never been charged with a crime.
  
  This is no trivial matter. We cannot allow F.B.I. or Justice Department officials to unnecessarily publicize pending investigations concerning candidates of either party while an election is underway. That is an abuse of power. Allowing such a precedent to stand will invite more, and even worse, abuses of power in the future.

  ---

  Richard W. Painter, a professor at the University of Minnesota Law School, was the chief White House ethics lawyer from 2005 to 2007.

Bravo.

Such acts could also be prohibited under the Hatch Act, which bars the use of an official position to influence an election. That is why the F.B.I. presumably would keep those aspects of an investigation confidential until after the election.

I agree in part, but then Comey already stepped into influencing the election with his previous announcement that the investigation was complete. Since that appears to be premature, if he held his tongue he could be accused withholding information and misleading the public if he did not say something about restarting it. It's a no-win situation IMHO.

That being said, IMHO I don't think the FBI (or any police dept) should ever comment on a pending investigation of a particular individual or where it stands. I think a lot of lives are ruined by the innuendo of an investigation (even if it proves to be totally baseless), and such is usually the reason they make the disclosure in the first place.

Keeping ones mouth shut seems to be a vanishing attribute.