FBI Director James Comey had more than two options in his decision to go before Congress last October about the agency's probe of Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server, Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Sunday.
In an interview on NBC News' "Meet The Press," the California Democrat slammed Comey for his claim last week that he had to either disclose newly discovered emails on the laptop of shamed former lawmaker Anthony Weiner, or to conceal them from Congress.
"I think you look before you leap," Feinstein said. "The FBI has a policy of not announcing October surprises. This was 11 days before the election."
"What he could have done is said, 'Let's just be sure. Let's get a search warrant. Let's look at the Weiner computer and let's see what there is,'" she continued.
"And if he did that, he would have the information that, 'well, there's no need for another investigation. We have all of this material already… We have already looked at them.' So there was no need."
Clinton herself cited the FBI's role in her failed 2016 White House bid and Feinstein said she was right.
"What [Comey] did was authorize what I believe to be a needless investigation, 11 days which I have no doubt – and I believe that the Clinton campaign's polls show this – that it made a big difference," she said."The FBI should not do that. So I don't understand the march to do this immediately when he could have gotten the search warrant first."