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Ruth Marcus: FBI director declares his independence

On Tuesday, in a stinging assessment of her email practices as secretary of state, Comey rebuked Clinton and her aides for being “extremely careless” in their handling of classified information and contradicted numerous defenses and explanations she’s put forward for months. Yet he added that they should not be prosecuted.

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Chaffetz added that he would forward Clinton’s testimony before the House Benghazi Committee to the FBI to investigate whether or not she lied under oath to Congress.

FBI Director James Comey testified Thursday before the House of Representatives Oversight and Government Reform Committee on the FBI’s probe of Hillary Clinton’s and her aides’ handling of e-mails containing classified information on her private e-mail system while she was Secretary of State. Lynch is likely to face questions of her own next week at a separate oversight hearing of the House Judiciary Committee.

“There is no way anybody would bring a case against John Doe or Hillary Clinton for the second time in 100 years based on those facts, ” Comey told lawmakers, referring to a review of past prosecutions.

“There are two things that matter in a criminal investigation of a subject – what did the person do, and when they did that thing, what were they thinking?”.

Clinton was cleared of any wrongdoing but the findings of the FBI investigation cast doubt on her honesty and trustworthiness.

Asked if she agreed that she was “extremely careless”, Clinton declined to respond directly, repeatedly saying Comey had “clarified” his remarks in interviews with MSNBC and CNN.

Clinton up, she made them all look like idiots.

The State Department said Thursday it will reopen its internal investigation into whether Clinton compromised her handling of classified material.

The committee’s chairman, Republican Representative Trey Gowdy, said the panel voted to approve the 800-page report, with seven Republicans in favor and four Democrats opposed, in a closed-door meeting.

Attorney general Loretta Lynch said in a statement she was not pressing charges against anyone on the recommendation of Federal Bureau of Investigation director James Comey. “He said there was no direct evidence of intent”. “There are too many unanswered questions”, he said. Many saw this as a “double standard”, especially because Comey’s comments revealed Clinton’s declarations on the email scandal to be huge lies – just check out this Reason TV video on it. “But I do not see evidence that is sufficient to establish that Secretary Clinton or those with whom she was corresponding both talked about classified information on email and knew when they were doing it, that it was against the law”. Very rarely do defendants announce, “On this day, I intend to break this criminal code section”.

COMEY: I don’t, sitting here.

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“It seems to a lot of us that the Average Joe, the average American, that if they had done what you laid out in your statement, that they would be in handcuffs and they might be on their way to jail”, Chaffetz told Comey.

FBI Director Explains Why He Didn't Recommend Charging Clinton For “Gross Negligence”