
Hillary Clinton's campaign was rocked on Friday after the FBI sensationally reopened their investigation into her secret server after they discovered email exchanges between her and top aide Huma Abedin on her estranged husband Anthony Weiner's laptop.

The emails, which prompted FBI Director James Comey to reexamine the case, were found after Weiner's electronic devices were seized by the FBI during the probe into him sexting a 15-year-old girl.

The FBI swooped in on Weiner in September after DailyMail.com revealed he had sent explicit messages and graphic pictures to the 15-year-old, fully aware she was under-age.

After reviewing the emails, the FBI launched a move which sent shockwaves through both presidential campaigns.

In a letter sent to Congress, Comey said that he had launched an investigation into the 'pertinent' exchanges to determine if any of the emails - which allegedly number more than 1,000 in total - contain classified information and whether any of them are 'significant.'

The news broke while Clinton was flying on a plane with no WiFi coverage and was only told of the bombshell when she landed in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, just after 1pm, local time.

Finally six hours after carrying on with her scheduled rally as if nothing had happened, she held a brief news conference at 7pm, calling on the bureau to explain the issue in question without any delay and to immediately release whatever information it has about the probe.

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Huma Abedin and Hillary Clinton spoke on board Clinton's campaign plane just hours before news broke on Friday that the FBI was re-opening its investigation into the presidential nominee's emails after new emails came to light during a separate investigation into Abedin's husband, Anthony Weiner

The Federal Bureau of Investigation announced on Friday that was examining new Hillary Clinton emails it believes to be 'pertinent' to her case

Clinton was in the air, on her way to Iowa (pictured getting off the plane in Iowa), when the news of the re-opened investigation broke

Photographer Annie Leibovitz (right at the top of the steps) followed Clinton off the plane after conducting a photo shoot while in the air

Clinton, pictured getting into a vehicle once arriving in Iowa, had no WiFi coverage when the announcement was made

The FBI's bombshell was prompted by the discovery of 'another device' with emails relevant to the investigation and the stunning link between Clinton, Abedin and Weiner was first exposed by the New York Times.

NBC News national security correspondent Pete Williams reported that during their investigation, the FBI realized that Huma also used Weiner's laptop—which contained email exchanges between Abedin and Clinton.

He added that the FBI wanted to make plain this was not technically a re-opening of the probe, as it had never been shut.

Although Clinton said nothing immediately following the announcement, her campaign chairman John Podesta - whose own emails were published by WikiLeaks – issued a furious denunciation of Comey and suggested he had bowed to Trump's political pressure.

'It is extraordinary that we would see something like this just 11 days out from a presidential election,' the statement said.

'Upon completing this investigation more than three months ago, FBI Director Comey declared no reasonable prosecutor would move forward with a case like this and added that it was not even a close call.'

Six hours after carrying on with her scheduled rally as if nothing had happened, Clinton held a brief news conference at 7pm, calling on the bureau to explain the issue in question without any delay

HILLARY CLINTON GOES TO WAR WITH FBI IN BRIEF PRESS CONFERENCE DEMANDING IT EXPLAINS NEW EMAIL PROBE 'WITHOUT DELAY' In a dramatic turn in the presidential race Hillary Clinton called on the FBI to release whatever information it has about its re-started investigation of her email scandal 'without delay' in a press conference on Friday. She said she didn't know 'what to believe' regard what she called 'rumors' that the new information that came from trusted Aide Huma Abedin's laptop – a device she reportedly shared with disgraced ex-Rep. Anthony Weiner. 'We are 11 days out from perhaps the most important election of our lifetimes,' Clinton told reporters in the surprise press conference inside the choral room of Roosevelt High School in Des Moines. 'The American people deserve to get the full and complete facts immediately.' At the end, she was asked about the reports, in the New York Times and other outlets, that her aide Huma Abedin and Weiner had been the source of the new emails. 'We've heard these rumors,' said Clinton – who sat near Abedin on her campaign on the flight to Des Moines. 'We don't know what to believe and I'm sure there will be even more rumors. That's why it is incumbent upon the FBI to tell us what they're talking about,' she said. 'Because right now your guess is as good as mine and I don't think that's good enough.' Asked if she had been contacted by the FBI or whether she was concerned that the new emails would reveal any classified information, Clinton responded to the first part of the question. 'No – we have not been contacted by anyone. First we knew about it is I assume when you knew about it, when this letter sent to Republican members of the House was released. 'So we don't know the facts, which is why we are calling on the FBI to release all the information that it has. 'Lets get it out,' she said. She observed that FBI director Comey had said that the new information may not be significant. Asked about trust issues leading up to election day, she responed: 'I think people a long time ago made up their minds about the emails. I think that's factored into what people think, and now they're choosing a president.' Advertisement

'In the months since, Donald Trump and his Republican allies have been baselessly second-guessing the FBI and, in both public and private, browbeating the career officials there to revisit their conclusion in a desperate attempt to harm Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign.

'FBI Director Comey should immediately provide the American public more information than is contained in the letter he sent to eight Republican committee chairmen.

'Already, we have seen characterizations that the FBI is 'reopening' an investigation but Comey's words do not match that characterization.

'Director Comey's letter refers to emails that have come to light in an unrelated case, but we have no idea what those emails are and the Director himself notes they may not even be significant.'

Donald Trump hailed the move as a chance to right 'a miscarriage of justice' as a crowd of supporters in Manchester, New Hampshire, chanted 'lock her up'.

The sense of a new Clinton crisis came as Clinton, a former secretary of state and the Democratic nominee for the White House, collapsed to four points in the latest nationwide survey polling.

Clinton was pictured leaving her campaign plane after it landed in New York on Friday night after her campaign was rocked by the news of the FBI probe

A downcast Abedin was also pictured leaving Hillary's campaign plane dressed in an orange winter coat and laden with luggage

Comey said that after learning about the emails he advised the bureau to take 'appropriate investigative steps' to review them.

Comey sent the letter to heads of the of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees, Judiciary Committees and two Appropriations subcommittees that deal with justice issues, as well as the House's Oversight Committee and the Senate's Homeland Security Committee.

'In connection with an unrelated case,' Comey told them, 'the FBI has learned of the existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the investigation.'

Comey said that after becoming aware of the new information yesterday he 'agreed that the FBI should take appropriate investigative steps designed to allow investigators to review these emails to determine whether they contain classified information, as well as to access their importance to our investigation.

'Although the FBI cannot yet access whether or not this material may be significant, and I cannot predict how long it will take us to complete this additional work, I believe it is important to update your Committees about our efforts,' he wrote.

It was later revealed on Friday that Comey reportedly told bureau staffers in a separate memo that he broke custom in telling Congress about the reopening of the investigation because of its political sensitivity.

In an internal memo obtained by Fox News, Comey said the bureau would not ordinarily communicate with the public about its ongoing investigations, but said he felt he needed to do so as Clinton is seeking presidency.

As he explains his decision, he also notes he felt an 'obligation' to inform lawmakers about the investigation given he had testified repeatedly that their investigation into Clinton's email was completed.

When she made her first public appearance in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, just an hour after news broke, she said nothing about the investigation

The investigation began after devices belonging to Abedin and her estranged husband Anthony Weiner were seized in a separate federal investigation

The FBI swooped on Weiner and Abedin after DailyMail.com revealed that he had sent sexual messages to a 15-year-old girl

In the messages, which were obtained by the Dailymail.com, Weiner repeatedly complimented the girl's body, told her that she made him 'hard'. He also sent the girl a selfie from a hot tub

Weiner and the girl used several anonymous messaging apps, like the one pictured above, where every line of text - and the sender's name - disappear after the message is opened. In one message he told he would 'bust that tight p***y so hard'

The message continues, and Weiner says he would bust that tight p***y so hard and so often that you would leak and limp for a week'. Weiner began talking to the girl in January, after she messaged him on Twitter

The sexting scandal was revealed after it was discovered that Weiner had been sending another woman shirtless selfies with his child in the frame

'Of course we don’t ordinarily tell Congress about ongoing investigations, but here I feel an obligation to do so given that I testified repeatedly in recent months that our investigation was completed,' Comey wrote in the memo.

'I also think it would be misleading to the American people were we not to supplement the record.

'At the same time, however, given that we do not know the significance of this newly discovered collection of emails, I don’t want to create a misleading impression.

'In trying to strike that balance, in a brief letter, and in the middle of an election season, there is significant risk of being misunderstood, but I wanted you to hear directly from me about it.'

Clinton's campaign officials gaggled with reporters earlier in the flight on Friday, but had decamped the press section by the time the FBI investigation news reached 30,000 feet.

ANTHONY WEINER SEXTING SCANDAL The FBI, the New York Police Department, and US attorneys in New York and North Carolina opened investigations into Weiner's conduct in late September, after DailyMail.com exclusively reported on Sept. 21 that the former politician carried on a months-long online relationship with a 15-year-old high school girl. Weiner exchanged flirtatious and sexually-charged messages with the teen for months after the girl struck up a conversation with him on Twitter in January. Weiner told the girl he woke up 'hard' after thinking about her, sent her shirtless photos, and complimented her body. He also encouraged her to talk to him on the video-chat application Skype. The girl alleged that during these Skype conversations, Weiner asked her to get undressed and touch herself. She claimed he also asked her to dress up in school girl outfits and pretend he was her teacher and brought up 'rape fantasies.' Weiner issued a statement to the Dailymail.com apologizing for 'repeatedly demonstrate[ing] terrible judgment about the people I have communicated with online and the things I have sent.' In one particularly lewd message, he told the teen: 'I would bust that tight p***y so hard and so often that you would leak and limp for a week.' Advertisement

After a prolonged delay on the tarmac while her motorcade waited outside her campaign plane, the candidate emerged, followed by celebrity photographer Annie Leibovitz.

Leibovitz, who was traveling aboard Clinton's campaign plane, was escorted forward in the aircraft to conduct a photo shoot of Clinton while in flight, around the time that word broke of the sudden turnaround by the FBI.

Leibovitz shot photos for a minute or so, at which point Clinton and her top campaign aides moved into a private area to huddle.

Liebovitz was not invited to shoot the high-stakes strategy session.

Clinton waved to reporters and didn't respond to shouted questions about whether she had been informed that the FBI had reopened its investigation.

She then got into her motorcade and headed to her first campaign rally of the day.

Asked to react to the FBI announcement a senior Clinton campaign spokesperson told NBC News: 'No idea.'

While still taking in the news while in Des Moines, Clinton did remark to her supporters about the 'unusual' election this year.

'We’ve got to keep our foot on the gas. Donald Trump says he can still win, and he’s right,' Clinton told supporters at Roosevelt High School in Des Moines, to boos from the crowd at mention of her GOP rival.

'You know this has been such an unusual election. I don’t take anything, any place or anyone for granted,' Clinton said.

'I’m gonna work as hard as I can all the way until the end,' she vowed.

Clinton's running mate Tim Kaine was campaigning in Tallahassee, Tennessee, on Friday.

He ducked a reporter's question about the investigation, saying, 'I've got to read more. I've got to read a little more'.

At the top of an early afternoon campaign rally in Manchester, New Hampshire, Trump took a victory lap and congratulated the FBI for deciding to take a second look at the case.

'The FBI has just sent a letter to Congress informing them that they have discovered new emails pertaining to the former secretary of state Hillary Clinton's investigation,' he said, as 1,600 people erupted in a chant of 'Lock her up!'

'And they are reopening the case into her criminal and illegal conduct that threatens the security of the United States of America.'

'Hillary Clinton's corruption is on a scale we have never seen before. We must not let her take her criminal scheme into the Oval Office,' Trump declared.

'I have great respect for the fact that the FBI and the Department of Justice are now willing to have the courage to right the horrible mistake that they made. This was a grave miscarriage of justice that the American people fully understood, and it is everybody's hope that it is about to be corrected.'

He added a moment later: 'With that being said, the rest of my speech is going to be so boring! Should I even make the speech?'

His jubilant crowd screamed: 'Yeah!'

'The news this morning is – this is bigger than Watergate,' Trump said later in his speech.

In Bensalem, Pennsylvania, Trump's running mate Mike Pence was cheered as he told a rally: 'We commend the FBI for having the courage to re-open this case because no-one is above the law.'

FBI Director James Comey said in a letter to Congress that an investigative team is seeking to determine if any of the emails contain classified information

When Clinton (pictured in September) arrived in Iowa, she waved to reporters and didn't respond to shouted questions about whether she had been informed that the FBI had reopened its investigation

Pence also tweeted: 'We call on the FBI to immediately release all emails pertinent to their investigation. Americans have the right to know before Election Day.'

House Speaker Paul Ryan, meanwhile, said in a statement that Clinton 'has nobody but herself to blame' for the re-opened investigation.

'She was entrusted with some of our nation's most important secrets, and she betrayed that trust by carelessly mishandling highly classified information,' he said.

'This decision, long overdue, is the result of her reckless use of a private email server, and her refusal to be forthcoming with federal investigators.

'I renew my call for the Director of National Intelligence to suspend all classified briefings for Secretary Clinton until this matter is fully resolved,' Ryan said.

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, Ryan's second-in-command, said the FBI's decision to take another look at the Clinton case 'showcases her fundamental lack of judgment and disregard for protecting and handling of our nation's highly classified secrets'.

Bombshell: How James Comey started the extraordinary day of drama

McCarthy advised the FBI to conduct its 'investigation expeditiously, and thoroughly brief the American people of its findings in a completely transparent manner'.

An hour after the October surprise became public, President Barack Obama emerged from the White House and boarded Marine Force One.

The sitting president, on his way now to Orlando, Florida, to campaign for Clinton, ignored shouted questions about his former cabinet secretary's email scandal.

As he campaigned for Hillary Clinton in Orlando, Obama urged young voters 'vote up and down the ticket' for Democrats in the run up to the election.

'I understand that right now, the polls show Hillary having a lead,' Obama said during a rally at the University of Central Florida in Orlando, NBC reported.

'Sometimes when you get a lead, whether it's in sports or politics, you start feeling good. You start celebrating too early. You start getting turnovers, you start missing some free throws. Suddenly it gets a little closer.'

'And next thing you know you look up, and you let it slip away,' he added.

At a rally in Manchester, New Hampshire, Donald Trump congratulated the FBI for deciding to take a second look at the case

Trump told attendees of a campaign rally that the news of the FBI investigation is 'bigger than Watergate', after saying that Clinton's 'corruption is on a scale we have never seen before'

THE TALE OF HILLARY CLINTON'S PRIVATE SERVER The Clintons' Chappaqua home where the server began life June 2008: An Apple Power Mac server, purchased by Bill Clinton's aide Justin Cooper in 2007, is installed in the basement of the Clintons' home in Chappaqua, New York. It initially handles traffic for Bill Clinton but soon is used by Clinton and her staff as well Fall: Computer equipment from Clinton's presidential campaign is tapped as a replacement - a Dell PowerEdge 2900 Windows Server and Microsoft Exchange and a 1950 running a BlackBerry Enterprise Server. Clinton aide Bryan Pagliano starts work on building the system, believing it will be used by Bill Clinton's staff January 2009: It is decided that the Apple server must be replaced as it is having problems with the volume of traffic March: Pagliano installs the server he has built in a rack in the Chappaqua house basement, with the help of Cooper. Pagliano, who is administrator for the new device, transfers the Apple server emails onto the new device. The new server is backed up once a week onto a Seagate external hard drive. The FBI has never obtained the Apple server for examination January 2013: Clinton's chief of staff, Cheryll Mills, recommends Denver, Colorado-based IT firm Platte River Networks (PRN) to manage the server to help with user limitations and reliability concerns Denver-based Platte held a 'One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest'-themed party while at a conference June 23: A Platte employee removes the server from the Chappaqua home to a data center in Secaucus, New Jersey, run by Equinix, to migrate it to a new server June 30: The Clintons' email accounts are migrated to the Platte server July 18: Platte signs an agreement to manage the new, third server, a Dell PowerEdge R620. Platte subsequently configure a backup device from Datto, Inc, a Connecticut-based company, to take multiple snapshots of the system daily and to store the information for 60 days. The device also takes copies of the Pagliano server between June 24-December 23 December 2013: The Pagliano server is fully decommissioned December 2014: Clinton and Abedin begin using the domain hrcoffice and stop using clintonemail.com October 3, 2015: The Pagliano server is voluntarily handed over to the FBI Advertisement

Earlier on Friday, Obama spokesman Eric Schultz told reporters riding aboard Marine One that the White House did not coordinate with the FBI on today's bombshell announcement.

'The only notification we've received is the letter that was made public by press reports from Director Comey to Capitol Hill,' Schultz said.

'We had that letter after it was made public, so we did not have advance warning.'

Schultz says the White House heard about the letter through 'press reports'.

He further stated that it is 'the president's expectation is that all FBI efforts follow the facts, wherever they lead…The president believes that decisions made by independent prosecutors must be made independently of politics.'

The White House spokesman said Obama stands firm in his endorsement of his former secretary of state to succeed him in office and is 'proud to support her from now until Election Day.

'I don't think anything has surfaced to change the president's views and opinions of Secretary Clinton,' he said.

Obama is unlikely to discuss the FBI investigation today as he talks Clinton up in the must-win state of Florida.

Instead, Schultz told reporters, 'You can expect a lot of the themes he's hit before, touting why he believes Secy. Clinton is uniquely qualified to be commander in chief.'

House Benghazi Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy spent two years investigating Clinton, famously keeping her in the chair under oath for 11 hours.

Republicans on the committee say the State Department and Clinton hampered their investigation by keeping emails related to the September 11, 2012, attack from them.

Gowdy did not immediately make a statement in response to the FBI's announcement, though.

Neither did House Oversight Chairman Jason Chaffetz. The Republican Congressman said on his Twitter account that Comey told him about the pertinent emails and said 'case reopened', but that was all.

Mark Meadows, a Republican on the oversight committee, couldn't say which FBI investigation Comey was referring to in his letter.

'I can share with you that in discussions some weeks ago that some of the other areas that they were looking at…might have cross over,' he told Fox News on Friday afternoon.

'And so, not speaking specifically with any knowledge of any particular investigation,' he said, 'just the FBI in their normal way of being complete and making sure that everything is buttoned up, it would suggest that, the one criteria that Director Comey mentioned was intent.'

Meadows said he doesn't believe there there has to be intent for Clinton 'to be held criminally liable.

'But it would suggest that, perhaps, they found emails that, that would indicate that there was some intent to cover up or at least dispose of improperly,' Meadows said.

Clinton's lawyers deleted 33,000 emails they deemed personal in nature before she turned over her work product to the State Department.

Her team printed those emails out, roughly 30,000 of them, and put them in bankers boxes it told government officials they could pick up from her lawyer's Washington, DC-area office.

FBI notes from the case revealed that that two of the boxes were missing and did not indicate that they were ever found.

Joseph diGenova, the former US attorney for Washington, DC, said the way the case was reopened signaled that there was significant dissent inside the FBI over how Comey previously handled the investigation.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has released thousands of emails damaging Hillary Clinton

An hour after the news became public, President Barack Obama emerged from the White House and boarded Marine Force One

Comey had publicly defended the Clinton email probe as one of the most thorough investigations of all time, and diGenova said the revelation of unsearched emails undercut the bureau chief.

'I believe that there is an open revolt underway inside the bureau. Not the kind you're going to read about because that's not the way revolts happen in the FBI,' said diGenova. 'They serve [leadership] up publicly with new information. And what they did today was they made the FBI director look like a fool, and he knew it.'

DiGenova said that based on Comey's letter, it sounded like he planned to turn the investigation over to the same team that handled the case previously.

'I think he is sitting on a huge powder keg inside the bureau,' diGenova added.

Congressman Darrell Issa, chairman of the Oversight committee at the time of the Benghazi, attack said in a Friday afternoon tweet: 'FBI reopening investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of private server, it's important we get it right this time.'

Appearing on Fox News later in the afternoon, Issa told Neil Cavuto that he sent Clinton a letter when she was still secretary of state asking about a personal email address. Issa says he reminded her that State must have access to any messages she was sending or receiving that way if they pertained to her government work.

'Had she done what she knew she should have done she wouldn't be in this position,' Issa said on Fox. 'Had she come clean early on, she wouldn't be in this position.'

Had Huma Abedin and Anthony Weiner done what they should have done, they wouldn't be in this position, either, he said.

'This is a major scandal…It's a scandal that didn't have to be,' Issa said. 'All she had to do was obey the law.'

It's not too late for Clinton 'to stop digging a hole', the Republican congressman said.

House Homeland Security Chairman Mike McCaul said Comey's decision was 'overdue and attributable to her egregious use of a private server' and her 'fast and loose handling of classified information'.

'Her actions have likely compromised our national security, American intelligence and the brave men and women who carry out our most important military operations,' McCaul said. 'As a former federal prosecutor, I firmly believe and understand that no one should be above the law.'

Republicans rejoiced on Friday afternoon as a once-shut door swung back open with just enough time for them to keep Clinton out of the White House.

Arkansas Sen Tom Cotton also urged the FBI to 'conduct a speedy review of these new materials so that any conclusions or consequences can be made public before the November 8 election'.

'The American people deserve that clarity before they make their choice of who will serve as our next Commander-in-Chief,' said Cotton, a prospective 2020 candidate.

Reince Priebus, chairman of the Republican National Committee, said Comey couldn't have taken the decision to reexamine Clinton lightly.

'This stunning development raises serious questions about what records may not have been turned over and why, and whether they show intent to violate the law,' Priebus said.

'What's indisputable is that Hillary Clinton jeopardized classified information on thousands of occasions in her reckless attempt to hide pay-to-play corruption at her State Department. '

The Republican chief said, 'This alone should be disqualifying for anyone seeking the presidency, a job that is supposed to begin each morning with a top secret intelligence briefing.'