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FBI Director James Comey says agents concluded that all computer aide Paul Combetta was trying to do was replace Hillary Clinton's email address so it wouldn't be revealed to the public. | AP Photo Comey denies Clinton email 'Reddit' cover-up

The FBI concluded that a computer technician working on Clinton's email was not engaged in an illicit cover-up when he asked on the Reddit website for a tool that could delete a "VIP" email address throughout a large file, FBI Director James Comey said Wednesday.

Republican lawmakers have suggested that the July 2014 Reddit post from a user believed to be Platte River Networks specialist Paul Combetta showed an effort to hide Clinton's emails from investigators.

However, at a House Judiciary Committee hearing Wednesday, Comey said FBI agents concluded that all the computer aide was trying to do was replace Clinton's email address so it wouldn't be revealed to the public.

"Our team concluded that what he was trying to do was when they produced emails not have the actual address but have some name or placeholder instead of the actual dot-com address in the 'From:' line," Comey said.

Raising the issue with Comey, Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) said he believed it was obviously part of a cover-up.

"This clearly demonstrates an action to destroy evidence by people operating Clinton's private server and her staff," Goodlatte said.

In the 2014 Reddit post, user "Stonetear" described "a very interesting situation where I need to strip out a VIP’s (VERY VIP) email address from a bunch of archived email that I have both in a live Exchange mailbox, as well as a PST file."

The posting continued: "Basically, they don’t want the VIP’s email address exposed to anyone, and want to be able to either strip out or replace the email address in the to/from fields in all of the emails we want to send out."

Comey said he wasn't sure whether the FBI knew about the Reddit posting when prosecutors granted Combetta immunity to get statements from him about what transpired. However, he added that such a deletion wouldn't automatically be considered an effort to destroy evidence.

"Not necessarily ... It would depend what his intention was and why he wanted to do it," the FBI director said.