FBI has no warrant to read newly-obtained Clinton emails: Officials

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has still not obtained a warrant to read newly discovered emails linked to the investigation of a private server Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton used during her tenure as secretary of state, officials say.

In a letter to Congress on Friday, FBI Director James Comey said the bureau had uncovered new emails related to a comprehensive probe into whether Clinton or her aides had mishandled classified information.

"In connection with an unrelated case, the FBI has learned of the existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the investigation. I am writing to inform you that the investigative team briefed me on this yesterday, and I agreed that the FBI should take appropriate investigative steps designed to allow investigators to review these emails to determine whether they contain classified information, as well as to assess their importance to our investigation," he wrote.

When Comey wrote the letter, “he had no idea what was in the content of the emails,” one of the officials told Yahoo News.

As of Saturday night, the agency was still in negotiations with the Justice Department to let them read any of the newly discovered emails of Clinton's aide Huma Abedin 

“We do not have a warrant,” a senior law enforcement official said. “Discussions are under way [between the FBI and the Justice Department] as to the best way to move forward.”

Although no FBI agent has read the material, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has said that Comey would not have written such a letter, unless he knew the significance of the emails.

A message Comey wrote to all FBI agents on Friday suggested that investigators could not review the content of those emails due to lack of legal authority.

In the message, Comey said he had only been briefed about the issue on Thursday, adding the “recommendation” of investigators was “with respect to seeking access to emails that have recently been found in an unrelated case.”

Also, some have argued that the letter Comey wrote to Congress was perhaps misleading.

“This letter is troubling because it is vaguely worded and leaves so many questions unanswered,” Sen. Patrick Leahy, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, and three other Democrats on the panel wrote Comey and Attorney General Loretta Lynch.

Trump celebrated Comey’s announcement on Friday, praising the FBI for its “courage to right the horrible mistake that they made.”

“This was a grave miscarriage of justice that the American people fully understood, and it is everybody’s hope that it is about to be corrected,” he said.

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