WASHINGTON _ Just as Hillary Clinton appeared to be cruising to Election Day with the wind at her back, the FBI rattled the presidential race by announcing it is again probing emails that might be related to her private server, rekindling a politically damaging controversy for Clinton and reinvigorating Republicans scrambling to hold on to congressional seats.
The surprise word from FBI Director James Comey came after his agency discovered new communications in portable electronic devices seized from close Clinton aide Huma Abedin and her estranged husband, Anthony Weiner, a former New York congressman, according to a law enforcement official.
Comey wrote in a letter to Congress that the newly discovered messages could be relevant to questions of whether Clinton and her aides mishandled classified information while she was secretary of state.
The emails found were not to or from Clinton, but contained information that the FBI felt warranted a further review to see whether they pertained to the probe into Clinton's handling of classified material, a second official said.
The information appears to be "more of what" agents had already uncovered, the second official said, but in an abundance of caution, they felt they needed to further scrutinize them.
Because Comey had told Congress that the FBI had finished its investigation, he felt he needed to let lawmakers know that agents were continuing to look into the case in light of the recent discovery, the official said.
Another law enforcement official said there were no indications that the new emails had been withheld by Clinton or others. The FBI came across the communications while separately investigating whether Weiner exchanged sexually explicit texts with a 15-year-old North Carolina girl. Investigators are examining at least one phone used by Weiner and a computer that was used by both Weiner and Abedin.
News of Comey's letter sent the stock market falling and Republican candidates rewriting their stump speeches. The Clinton campaign was caught off guard, as the letter emerged while the candidate and her entourage, including Abedin, were traveling on a campaign plane with no working Wi-Fi en route to a campaign event in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Her running mate, Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine, said he was still digesting the news when asked about it during a campaign stop in Florida.
Comey's letter was cryptic. He said he could not assess whether they contained "significant" material or "how long it will take us to complete this additional work." He wrote that the FBI would "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."
Nonetheless, the announcement that FBI agents would again be combing through Clinton's emails was enough to shift the tone of the race. Minutes after the news broke, Donald Trump took the stage in Manchester, N.H., to suggest the FBI was all but ready to indict Clinton _ which Comey's letter hardly suggested.
"Hillary Clinton's corruption is on a scale we have never seen before," Trump said as the crowed roared "lock her up," a staple chant at his rallies. "We must not let her take her criminal scheme into the Oval Office."
Trump branded the latest news from the FBI "bigger than Watergate."
Congressional GOP candidates in tight races, who have been struggling to deflect voter attention away from their uneasiness with a Republican presidential nominee who has been a drag on his party's ticket, were also quick to pounce.
"This decision shows exactly why we need strong watchdogs in Congress to ensure thorough oversight of the executive branch," Rep. Darrell Issa of California said in a statement. "The federal government constantly needs to be held accountable to curb poor judgment _ like using a private server to circumvent federal records laws _ and incomplete investigations that fail to deliver justice and erode public faith in government."
House Speaker Paul Ryan renewed his call to suspend classified briefings to the Democratic presidential nominee. Like Trump, Ryan took liberties in interpreting Comey's carefully worded letter. Ryan declared the FBI is reopening its investigation into Clinton's private email server, which is not what Comey wrote.
While the FBI announcement is unlikely to substantially change the contours of a presidential race in which Clinton is polling far ahead, and at least 17 million Americans have already cast their ballots through early voting, it could provide a badly needed boost to congressional Republicans. Antipathy toward Clinton is the issue that most unites the party.
Pennsylvania Republican Sen. Pat Toomey, who is locked in a tight race with Democrat Katie McGinty, quickly sought to link his opponent to Clinton's email woes, pointing to a controversy in Pennsylvania over some of McGinty's electronic communications. "We knew McGinty was in complete lock-step with Hillary Clinton, but sharing an email scandal is ridiculous," Toomey spokesman Ted Kwong said in an email.
Other Republicans demanded their opponents disavow Clinton _ just as Clinton and her allies have for months been demanding Republican candidates disavow Trump following some of his more incendiary comments on the campaign trail and the emergence of a video in which Trump boasted of his uninvited sexual advances toward women.
