What’s Hillary hiding as FBI plays spoilsport?

It couldn’t have come at a worse time for the Democratic presidential candidate. In the final lap of one of the most consequential elections of our times, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) may have played spoilsport. The agency’s heads up to the US Congress that it is investigating a new cache of emails linked to Hillary Clinton — to check whether it contains any classified information — raises the possibility of criminal investigation being opened against her. This is both dramatic and unprecedented. With just a week and a half to go before the D-day, the announcement might disrupt the elections at a very critical time. It is possible that the outcome of the investigation amounts to zero — that nothing significant is found in the emails. But in an era of perception and semantics — timing and optics are everything. Already Trump wants Clinton drawn and quartered.

Will the FBI’s bombshell effectively damage Clinton’s chances in an election in which she has staked everything? Has the FBI been premature in the disclosure and timing of the new information? Although James Comey, the FBI Director, informed Congress that he didn’t know yet “the significance of this newly discovered collection of emails”, the revelation might alter the course of the election. America’s prime federal law enforcement agency could well be accused of playing politics at the expense of the Democratic candidate. Trying to salvage the situation before it goes completely out of hand, Clinton was quick to come out and demand “full and complete” facts around the email to be immediately shared “without further delay”. Ideally the FBI should have continued with its time-tested history of exercising extreme caution in the run up to elections so as not to influence the results. But in a season marked by recklessness, it appears that everyone — including the FBI — has thrown caution to the wind.