Watergate, of course, was the political scandal that brought down Richard Nixon when he went skinny-dipping in a lake behind the White House. Or something. If you don’t know what Watergate is, ask your great-grandparents.

Advertisement

Update 2:54pm: And now Trump’s running mate Mike Pence is calling for the FBI to “immediately release all emails pertinent to their investigation.” Why would Pence call for an investigation like this to be conducted in public? Because “Americans have the right to know before Election Day.”

Advertisement

Pete Williams of NBC has quoted anonymous officials as saying that whatever this isn’t won’t be resolved by Election Day, though they did note that the emails didn’t come from Clinton. But you can bet that the Republicans will use this ambiguity about whatever they contain to their advantage for the next two weeks. And probably beyond.

Update: 3:08pm: According to Rush Limbaugh, today’s FBI announcement is probably a purposeful distraction to take people’s eyes off the Wikileaks revelations.

“The cynical view of the FBI reopening the case in the Hillary Clinton emails goes this way: Comey is just doing this to take everybody’s attention off of the Wikileaks email dump. He’s going to make everybody think for the next three or four days that there’s really something to be forthcoming here,” Limbaugh said.

Advertisement

“The Wikileaks scandal is right now starting to hurt, because it’s exposing the fraud and the collusion at the Clinton Foundation,” he continued. “Everybody understands that you’re not supposed to get rich off a charity.”

“As Hillary starts plummeting in the polls, 8 points down in the Washington Post,” Limbaugh continued. “Riding to the rescue, the Lone Ranger, James Comey announcing that they’re reopening the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails. Everybody stops talking about what is easily portrayed and what is easily understandable in the Wikileaks story and start speculating about what Comey and the FBI are doing, all the while nobody knows.”

Advertisement

Update 3:18pm: According to the New York Times, the FBI’s new emails came from the agency’s investigation into Anthony Weiner. The FBI is investigating allegations that he was sexting with a minor. The device that was seized reportedly belongs to Weiner, who is currently separated from his wife Huma Abedin, a top Clinton aide.

Advertisement

Update 3:14pm: John Podesta, Clinton’s campaign chairman, has issued a statement. And he’s not happy.

Upon completing this investigation more than three months ago, FBI Director Comet’ declared no reasonable prosecutor would move forward with a case like this and added that it was not even a close call. In the months since, Donald Trump and his Republican allies have been baselessly second-guessing the FBI and, in both public and private, browbeating the career officials there to revisit their conclusion in a desperate attempt to harm Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.

FBI Director Comey should immediately provide the American public more information than is contained in the letter he sent to eight Republican committee chairmen. Already, we have seen characterizations that the FBI is ‘reopening’ an investigation but Comey’s words do not match that characterization. Director Comey’s letter refers to emails that have come to light in an unrelated case, but we have no idea what those emails are and the Director himself notes they may not even be significant.

It is extraordinary that we would see something like this just 11 days out from a presidential election.

The Director owes it to the American people to immediately provide the full details of what he is now examining. We are confident this will not produce any conclusions different from the one the FBI reached in July.

Advertisement

Update 7:05pm: Clinton is holding a press conference right now and says that she hasn’t heard from the FBI yet. She says that she thinks the American people have already “made up their minds about the emails” and encourages people to go out to vote.

Advertisement

You can watch video from the short press conference below.