In July, Comey said FBI investigators found that 113 emails from Clinton’s server contained classified information that had been secret at the time it was sent or received.
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Clinton was asked about the latest flare-up involving her use of a private email server as secretary of state, namely her comments Sunday on Fox News that the Federal Bureau of Investigation director, James Comey, had found her earlier remarks that she had never sent or received classified email on the server to be “truthful”. She was saying what Director Comey acknowledged to be true, that, when she spoke to the FBI, when she was talking to the FBI, the FBI thought her answers in that setting were truthful.
Clinton attributed the confusion to miscommunication, explaining that she had meant to say that her statements in public were no different than those she had made to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
“She didn’t say, ‘I didn’t intend to send classified material.’ That isn’t what she told the American people”, Wallace said.
Coming from a successful Democratic convention, combined with some of the most pronounced Republican infighting to date, Clinton took a commanding lead over her rival Donald Trump, both in national and many swing state polls. Perhaps more importantly than initial half-truths and misleading statements is that she seems unable to admit when she was caught in such a situation. “Look, knowing what I know now, I wouldn’t have done the private server in that way”. In response to questions from lawmakers, Comey indicated that Clinton or another government official in her position “should have known that an unclassified system was no place” for a classified conversation.
But when Comey told Congress he had “no basis for concluding that she was untruthful with us”, he was speaking only of her interview with agents. “Director James Comey said none of those things that you told the American public were true”, Wallace said. “I think that the people of this country don’t want somebody that’s going to short-circuit up there”.
Clinton went on to repeat that she “never sent or received” classified information on her private email server – a statement that is inconsistent with Comey’s testimony on Capitol Hill. And she explained that the economic frustration driving many of Donald Trump’s supporters should be taken as seriously as his “bigotry” that appeals to some.
At a time when critics charge that Trump lacks the temperament needed for a commander in chief, he also alleged that Clinton was “unbalanced” and “pretty close to unhinged”.
By appearing to stretch the truth, at best, Mrs. Clinton also is fueling the notion that the Justice Department may have decided not to press charges against her exclusively for political reasons.
Clinton last held a formal press conference on December 4, 2015, in Fort Dodge, Iowa.
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Friday’s event was carefully controlled, with Clinton taking just seven questions from preselected journalists.
