November 2, 2016 The Skanner Page 9
News
World News
Briefs
Obama Caught in Middle of
Unseemly Spat Over Clinton Emails
PHOTO BY JERRY FOSTER
WASHINGTON (AP) — The latest clamor over Hil-
lary Clinton’s emails has put Barack Obama in a spot
where no president wants to be: caught between his
attorney general, his FBI director and his preferred
White House successor.
With accusations of political interference flying,
Obama is trying to keep his distance as an internal
government spat bursts into public view. In a bit of
unwelcome irony, Obama’s strict adherence to the no-
tion of judicial independence, preached throughout
his years in office, has hamstrung his efforts to de-
fend Clinton against a GOP onslaught.
Democrats hope Obama’s hands-off approach to the
FBI forms a powerful contrast to Trump, whose insis-
tence that Clinton should be in prison seems to skip
a few steps of due process. But on Monday, White
POIC Visit
AP PHOTO/JAY LAPRETE
A group of students from Portland Opportunities Industrialization Center visited The Skanner News last week. Pictured here are Richard
(front, left), Jade, Angie, journalism instructor Delphine Criscenzo, language arts instructor Andrew Guerror, Oscar (left, center row),
Jacob, Nick, Elijian, Carlos and Nick.
President Barack Obama waves from the stairs of Air Force One
Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2016, as he arrives in Columbus, Ohio.
House spokesman Josh Earnest was left to explain
how Obama could be silent about an explosive issue.
“I’ll neither defend nor criticize what Director
Comey has decided to communicate to the public
about this investigation,” Earnest said, referring to
FBI Director James Comey. During an hour-plus-long
briefing that focused almost exclusively on Comey’s
decision, Earnest used some version of that formula-
tion — “neither defend nor criticize” — 10 times.
Criticism of Comey has mushroomed since his Fri-
day bombshell, announced in a letter to Congress: The
FBI is investigating more emails related to Clinton to
see whether they contain classified information.
New Email Discovery Raises
Question: Why Didn’t Abedin Know?
WASHINGTON (AP) — The discovery of another
cache of emails potentially important to the FBI’s in-
vestigation of Hillary Clinton’s email practices raises
an immediate question: How could close Clinton ad-
viser Huma Abedin have been unaware of their exis-
tence?
The emails were found on found on a computer
seized during an unrelated investigation involving
Abedin’s estranged husband, disgraced former New
York congressman Anthony Weiner. He is being in-
vestigated in connection with online communica-
tions with a teenage girl.
It’s possible that Abedin did not know about the
emails on Weiner’s computer, forgot about them or
for some other reason did not turn them over.
In a sworn deposition taken in June as part of a
lawsuit filed by the conservative legal group Judicial
Watch, Abedin was asked about what devices she had
used to send or receive messages from her account on
the clintonemail.com server. As part of the process
in 2015 of returning her work-related emails to the
State Department, Abedin said she “looked for all the
devices that may have any of my State Department”
work and provided two laptops and a Blackberry to
her lawyers for review.
Abedin made no mention of there being additional
devices where her emails might have been saved.
See WORLD BRIEFS on page 12