President Obama said Wednesday that Republicans are being unfair with their “troubling” accusations that Hillary Clinton committed crimes by jeopardizing national security with her private email server.

“All this talk about her engaging in criminal activities, the sort of prosecutorial case that you heard in Cleveland that seems to just ignore what a Republican FBI appointee of spotless integrity said,” Mr. Obama said on the “Today” show on NBC. “That’s troubling.”

During the Republican National Convention in Cleveland last week, delegates punctuated their meeting frequently with chants of “Lock her up!”

The president said of the GOP’s treatment of Mrs. Clinton, the Democratic nominee, “I don’t think it’s fair.”

“I think it’s indicative of the degree to which folks are rough on Hillary Clinton in ways that, even as somebody who has had my share of getting whacked in the public eye, I’m surprised by sometimes,” the president said.

Mr. Obama noted that FBI Director James B. Comey determined that Mrs. Clinton was “extremely careless” but broke no laws.

“If she made mistakes, they were not ones that were intended in any way to compromise American security,” Mr. Obama told Savannah Guthrie.

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