When it comes to scandal, Paul Ryan has stayed above the fray. The distinguished GOP policy wonk seldom waded into the IRS tea party targeting scandal or the Benghazi controversy, for example, preferring to talk tax reform or the nuts and bolts of fiscal legislation.

But when FBI Director James Comey announced this week he would not recommend charges against Hillary Clinton for her mishandling of classified material, the House speaker knew he had to get involved.


Ryan jumped with both feet into the Clinton email controversy this week after avoiding it for well over a year. He’s appeared on cable TV to question whether prosecutors gave Clinton preferential treatment. He greenlighted bringing Comey in for a daylong House committee grilling. And he personally wrote to Director of National Intelligence James Clapper to make the case that Clinton shouldn't receive classified briefings during the fall campaign, a standard practice for both parties' nominees.

The speaker’s office is even considering offering a House companion measure to a Senate proposal that would revoke security clearance for Clinton and her closest staffers, according to senior GOP leadership aides.

While the idea is mostly symbolic — President Barack Obama would never sign such legislation into law — Ryan’s actions amount to a sea change in tone and posture for the Wisconsin Republican, who tends to favor white papers and budget charts over partisan finger-pointing and scandal-hunting.

“When I came out of the 2012 convention as the vice presidential nominee, I then got weekly deeply classified briefings by the CIA and the rest of the intelligence community,” Ryan told reporters Thursday. “We are in a week, here, where the director of the FBI just said that Hillary Clinton ‘recklessly’ mishandled classified information … and in three weeks, when she comes out of the convention, she is going to get access to the most sensitive classified information our government has? No way … [S]he should not get that classified information.”

The move is sure to play well with the Republican base: For once, Ryan is in lockstep with the House’s most ardent conservatives, with whom he often finds himself at odds.

It also has the benefit of showing Trump, by example, where he should focus his attention — on Clinton’s email problems, an easy target for the Republican nominee, too — rather than on his Twitter account and praise of Saddam Hussein.

Senior GOP leadership aides close to Ryan said the speaker’s change in attitude was triggered by the FBI concluding its investigation. Ryan didn't want to politicize the probe and felt that weighing in before the FBI completed its work would be “poor form” and could impede the investigation, the sources note.

Now that the FBI is finished, Ryan says he just doesn't get how Comey could lay out Clinton's negligence in such detail but not do anything more about it.

“Director Comey’s presentation shredded the claims that Secretary Clinton made throughout the year with respect to this issue," the speaker told reporters this week. "He laid out a case how the things she had been saying she had or had not done were false." The FBI chief's news conference Tuesday explaining why he wasn't recommending charges, Ryan added, "raises more questions than provides answers."

Senior GOP leadership aides say Ryan's approach on the Clinton matter will be "serious and sober." They say he won't go on TV and make accusations he can't back up or ratchet up the heated political rhetoric that often surrounds Clinton scandals.

The staffers say he also isn't questioning Comey's integrity; most Republicans hold him in high regard. But as Thursday's daylong House Oversight Committee hearing with Comey showed, GOP lawmakers also aren't going to let the matter rest. Ryan included.

Just hours after Comey’s surprise news conference on Tuesday, Ryan went on Fox News to approve a request by Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) to conduct the hearing.

The move caught some observers by surprise. In keeping with a moratorium against Clinton-related investigations imposed by former Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) — with the notable exception of the Benghazi Committee — Ryan had held committees back from launching their own probes.

Chaffetz, for one, was rebuffed multiple times when he tried to initiate his own inquiries. Leadership told him: Let the FBI do its work first.

Ryan’s blessing this week to the Oversight panel — and to House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), who also sent Comey a list of questions — was the first sign of change. Neither panel would comment for this story.

Ryan went beyond unleashing committee leaders. He kept up a steady drumbeat on the Clinton matter in daily remarks to reporters, with his press office blasting out several news releases over the past three days.

In addition to the Clapper letter, in which Ryan argued that Clinton shouldn't receive classified briefings, Ryan penned a missive requesting that the FBI release all unclassified findings from its investigation.

And his actions may not stop there. A proposal by Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas) and Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.), which would revoke the security clearance of Clinton and her former State Department staffers, has caught his office's attention.

While Ryan said he wasn’t sure if Congress has the authority to prevent officials from briefing Clinton before the election — that's probably something only intelligence officials can do — his office is looking at the Senate proposal closely.

And overall, Ryan is showing no sign he'll relent anytime soon.

"We have seen nothing but stonewalling and dishonesty from Secretary Clinton on this issue and that means a lot more questions need to be answered,” he said before Thursday's hearing.