Initially caught off guard, US Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton’s campaign has swung between defiance, counterattack and painting her Republican rival, Donald Trump, as a mortal danger since FBI Director James Comey revived her e-mail scandal.
The decision, announced by Comey in a letter to lawmakers on Friday last week, initially dumbfounded Clinton and her allies, throwing what was already the US’ ugliest presidential election into spasms of shock.
Clinton was at the time on an airplane with malfunctioning Wi-Fi and, according to the Los Angeles Times, in the company of a childhood friend as she seemingly cruised toward an easy victory over Trump.
Photo: AFP
An aide said the former US secretary of state, first lady and senator took it “like a champ,” but the campaign is furious about the renewed focus on her use of a private e-mail server and frustrated that Comey has still not provided answers to them — or the public.
Campaign chairman John Podesta went on the attack, the most senior Democrat in the US Senate said Comey might have broken the law and another campaign manager, Robby Mook, decried what he called a “double standard.”
On Monday, Team Clinton pounced on a CNBC report that quoted an anonymous former FBI official as saying Comey thought it was too close to Election Day to name Russia as meddling in the election.
“That Director Comey would show more discretion in a matter concerning a foreign state actor than one involving the Democratic nominee for president is nothing short of jaw-dropping,” Mook said.
However, the woman poised to make history as the US’ first female president, humiliated 20 years ago by her husband’s dalliance with an intern and long hounded by Republicans, is nothing if not resilient.
The chorus of her campaign theme song — “I’ve still got a lot of fight left in me” — sums up Clinton perfectly.
Outwardly she has appeared relaxed and confident on a breakneck campaign tour in the battleground states of Florida and Ohio.
Boarding her plane on Monday, reporters caught a glimpse of her smiling, holding up a Halloween mask to her face.
However, the absence of one of her closest confidantes, the woman she has described as being akin to a second daughter, from her side over the past three days is a sign that Clinton is taking nothing for granted.
According to US media reports, Comey’s probe was renewed after agents seized a laptop used by the aide, Huma Abedin, and her now estranged husband, former US representative Anthony Weiner.
Abedin was photographed taking her son to school on Monday and some media outlets are speculating whether she is still destined for a plum job in the White House should Clinton win.
In public, Clinton initially called on the FBI to explain its decision without delay. On Saturday, she upped the pressure on Comey, calling his move “deeply troubling” and “unprecedented.”
However, by Monday, when polling data appeared to show that few voters were bothered by the news, she appeared more sanguine.
“I’m not making excuses. I’ve said it was a mistake and I regret it,” she said of her decision to use a private e-mail server while secretary of state, which sparked the initial FBI investigation.
However, apart from a brief news conference on Friday, she has not spoken to the up to three dozen reporters traveling with her campaign.
She has ignored shouted questions while boarding and deplaning her Boeing 737, instead smiling and waving to photographers.
Meanwhile, she has upped the ante against Trump, painting him as a dangerous hothead who cannot be trusted with the nuclear codes.
She was introduced at a campaign stop in Kent, Ohio, by a former nuclear missile launch officer who helped organize an open letter against the Republican candidate.
“Imagine him plunging us into a war because somebody got under his very thin skin. I hope you’ll think about that when you cast your vote,” Clinton told a rally in Cincinnati.
It is a message that her supporters are hearing loud and clear, undeterred by Comey’s announcement and convinced the maverick billionaire is a far worse candidate.
“This e-mail controversy is not a deal breaker for me,” said Crystian Wiltshire, a 26-year-old actor from Kentucky living in Cincinnati.
“Whereas on the other side, the comments that have been made, his [Trump’s] history as a businessman, those things can be classified as deal breakers,” he said. “For her to find some way to ruin that within a week’s time, I think that’s impossible at this point.”
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was