Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid's letter to FBI Director James Comey, accusing him of violating the Hatch Act is "laughable," considering he didn't make similar complaints about President Barack Obama or Attorney General Loretta Lynch about their actions concerning Hillary Clinton, Rep. Trey Gowdy said Monday.
"Sen. Reid didn't write a letter to either one of them about the Hatch Act," the South Carolina Republican told MSNBC's "Morning Joe" program. "I mean, President Obama is actively campaigning right now for a candidate for president, and that doesn't violate the Hatch Act. So how Jim Comey supplementing his record before Congress violates the Hatch Act is just laughable."
The Hatch Act limits political activities of federal employees, such as Comey, who is a Republican, to ensure their duties are administered in a nonpartisan fashion. However, some top executive branch officials, such as a president or vice president are exempt from the act.
Friday, Comey notified congressional committee leaders that additional evidence had surfaced in the probe into Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton's use of a personal email server, while not going into details.
Later in the day, it was that the emails had come from a laptop owned by Anthony Weiner while the FBI was investigating a sexting case against the former congressman. He is separated from wife Huma Abedin, one of Clinton's closest confidants and aides.
Gowdy, though, refused to blame Comey for sending the letter to congressional leaders.
"There's not a single one of the facts at hand that is directly attributable to Director Comey," said Gowdy. " He didn't tell her to set up her own private email server. He did not tell her to mislead the public about whether or not she sent and received public information. He didn't tell Huma Abedin, don't turn over all your devices.
"And God knows he didn't tell Anthony Weiner to sext with an under-aged girl. None of that is Comey's fault. The timing is a direct and natural consequences and probable consequence of the decision secretary Clinton made years ago."
Reid also did not call out Lynch for her meeting with former President Bill Clinton just shortly before Comey announced his decision not to recommend charges against the Democratic presidential nominee, Gowdy noted.
Comey's letter to congressional committee chairmen on Friday, though, didn't mean he was updating lawmakers, but instead, he was "supplementing his previous testimony," Gowdy insisted Monday. The letter, he continued, was "short on substance," but "it was just a notification letter."
Gowdy told Fox News' "America's Newsroom" later in the morning that while it's been reported there could be as many as 650,000 emails on Weiner's laptop, he couldn't say if the 33,000 emails deleted from Clinton's server are part of that cache.
"I don't think the bureau agents have read these emails, and I certainly have not," said Gowdy. The FBI said Sunday it has filed subpoenas to search the laptop, and the lawmaker said he hopes the FBI reveals what it finds.
"I hope that all records that are considered public records will ultimately be made available, but keep in mind, we're talking about decisions that Secretary Clinton made years ago that prompted you to even have to ask that question," he told Fox News' Bill Hemmer.
"I want the entire public record to be complete, whether that's classified information or whether it's a benign email about Yemen, these are public records, and the public is entitled to them."
He does, though, think that Clinton remains eligible for a security clearance, as the "ultimate security clearance check" takes place on Election Day, and if she wins, she'll obtain the classified information she'll need as a president.