FBI Director James Comey announced today that the FBI would be recommending that no charges be brought against Hillary Clinton, although the agency did find evidence that she mishandled classified information as Secretary of State.
Comey revealed that Clinton actually used several different private servers, as well as numerous mobile devices. Explaining how tedious the process was, the Director told reporters that they had to retrieve data from old servers which Clinton had decommissioned and replaced.
The director broke down that out of the 30,000 emails Mrs. Clinton handed over, 110 emails in 52 email chains have been determined to contain classified info at the time they were sent — 8 chains contained top secret info at the time they were sent.
Several thousands work related emails not among those turned over by Hillary were discovered, though Comey said no evidence could be found that evidence was purposely withheld or destroyed.
For a moment, it seemed that Comey was explaining why Hillary would be charged, as he said that any person in her position should have known this was improper and should have clearly recognized classified information and subject matter. Clinton also sent and received info from her private server while in foreign territory where hostile forces make it highly likely, Comey said, that foreign actors accessed classified information from Mrs. Clinton.
The Director also said the security culture at the State Deptartment is “severely lacking.”
However, Comey said that although there is evidence that Clinton grossly mishandled classified information, no reasonable prosecutor would bring charges. He said absent clear evidence of malicious intent or purposeful obstruction of justice, there is no precedent for charges.