Senator Dianne Feinstein, one of the Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee, opened her questioning of FBI Director James Comey Wednesday by asking why it was necessary for Comey to publicly disclose that he was investigating the contents of Anthony Weiner's computer.
"It was a hard choice, I still believe in retrospect the right choice", Efe news quoted him as saying before the Senate Judiciary Committee. "I cant consider for a second whose political fortunes will be affected", he said, a day after both the sitting US President and the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee sharply criticised him for his role in the outcome of last years presidential election.
Why was it necessary to announce 11 days before a presidential election that you were opening an investigation on a new computer without any knowledge of what was in that computer.
FBI Director James Comey's letter to Congress that he had reopened an investigation of her email server.
Comey said if he did find out who was responsible for the leaks, if Giuliani was indeed speaking the truth, he'd let the senators, who provide oversight to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, know - though added it may not be in a public forum.
Nevertheless, many Democrats felt that the damage had already been done and, in fact, Clinton on Tuesday blamed Comey for her election loss.
This is published unedited from the IANS feed.
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"Really the central problem we had with the whole email investigation was proving people ... had some sense they were doing something unlawful".
He said "it is a fair statement", when Senator Lindsey Graham asked if he agreed with him the only way the Russians are going to stop this for them to pay a price for interfering in the USA political process. Comey said he was not. "Concealing, in my view, would be catastrophic".
Clinton, according to sources with knowledge, is now working with former aides and donors to build an organisation that will fund and invest in groups that have impressed her since her 2016 election loss.
"There was no information and the election was lost", Feinstein said.
He told the panel one reason for the FBI's renewed interest in Clinton's case was that investigators had found emails, some of them classified, forwarded by Clinton's assistant Huma Abedin to her husband, who was not authorized to see such information. Worries about Russian hacks plagued the United States presidential election and its aftermath, with U.S. intelligence agencies accusing Russia of meddling in the race for the White House.
"Was it appropriate for you to comment on one investigation repeatedly, and not say anything about the other?" Patrick Leahy said. "But you said absolutely nothing regarding the investigation into the Trump campaign's connections to Russia's illegal efforts to help elect Donald Trump".
He said he had been concerned for months about how to report the investigation's findings to the public, and because of Justice Department actions including an impromptu airplane meeting between Bill Clinton and Attorney General Loretta Lynch he had concluded he needed to make the announcement himself.
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