In an interview published Wednesday, President Barack Obama offered his first comments on the FBI's examination of new emails related to its probe of Hillary Clinton's private email server, which FBI Director James Comey announced Friday.
Obama told NowThisNews, a left-leaning outlet, that the "norm" for his administration is "we don't operate on incomplete information" and "leaks."
"I do think that there is a norm that when there are investigations we don't operate on innuendo, and we don't operate on incomplete information, and we don't operate on leaks," he said in the interview. "We operate based on concrete decisions that are made."
"When this was investigated thoroughly last time, the conclusion of the FBI, the conclusion of the Justice Department, the conclusion of repeated congressional investigations was that she had made some mistakes but that there wasn't anything there that was prosecutable," the president added.
Obama said, however, that he did not want to meddle in the process.
We spoke with President Obama about the FBI's recent investigation into emails related to Hillary Clinton pic.twitter.com/3ivMp2TfVi
— NowThis (@nowthisnews) November 2, 2016
Comey came under fire from Democrats and some political analysts for notifying Congress in a short letter that an unrelated investigation turned up "pertinent" emails related to Clinton's case. He made the announcement 11 days before Election Day.
The FBI director had determined over the summer that Clinton acted with "extreme carelessness" in using the server while she was secretary of state, but concluded that "no reasonable" prosecutor would go forward with a case.
Multiple reports said Comey went against the recommendation of Attorney General Loretta Lynch in sending his letter to Congress. During a rally in Ohio this week, Clinton insisted that the FBI wouldn't reach any new conclusions and that the agency has "no case" against her.
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