Photo credit: The Goldwater

The power struggle between the DNC and the FBI over the investigation of the hacked servers is alarming. In a statement made on Wednesday, DNC told Buzzfeed that the FBI never requested access to its servers before concluding that the Russian hackers were responsible for the hacking. However, a senior law enforcement official disputed the DNC allegations: “The FBI repeatedly stressed to DNC officials the necessity of obtaining direct access to servers and data, only to be rebuffed until well after the initial compromise had been mitigated.”

“This left the FBI no choice but to rely upon a third party for information. These actions caused significant delays and inhibited the FBI from addressing the intrusion earlier,” said the official. However, a former FBI official made a statement to The Hill in which he pointed out that it’s not uncommon for the bureau to bypass an examination of hacked servers.

“In nine out of 10 cases, we don’t need access, we don’t ask for access, we don’t get access. That’s the normal [procedure],” explained Leo Taddeo, a former special agent. The FBI relied on the third-party CrowdStrike which investigated the DNC case. “Crowdstrike is pretty good. There’s no reason to believe that anything that they have concluded is not accurate,” an intelligence official told BuzzFeed.

The FBI made an announcement back in July in which it pointed out that it was investigating the hacking of DNC servers. This was after Crowdstrike alleged that it had evidence of Russian hackers breaking into the system. However, it’s worth noting that the FBI never gained access to the DNC’s hacked servers since it relied on the report issued by Crowdstrike.

A report issued by Buzzfeed they pointed out that no U.S. intelligence conducted an independent forensic analysis on the hacked DNC servers. This marks the latest twist in an astonishing stalemate between FBI and the Democrats.