An FBI search warrant connected with the bureau’s investigation of Hillary Clinton unsealed on Tuesday proves that law enforcement sought access to Anthony Weiner’s laptop to check for classified Clinton correspondence.
Weiner, the estranged husband of top Clinton aide Huma Abedin, is under investigation for allegedly sexting a 15-year-old girl. The unsealed documents show how the FBI framed its arguments for the search warrant to access the emails and detailed what information they were seeking.
“Data and information electronically stored on the Subject Laptop related to communications with email accounts used by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during her tenure as Secretary of State,” according to the search warrant.
Feds were also looking for information that might identify those responsible for “a computer intrusion,” presumably the breach of Clinton email servers largely believed by the U.S. intelligence community to, along with an incursion into the Democratic National Committee’s servers, have been executed by Russian hackers.
The warrant was issued on Oct. 30, little over a week before the election, and the 21-page document contains a ton of redacted info. It was ordered to be executed “on or before” Nov. 13.
The decision to unseal the documents is a victory for lawyer E. Randol Schoenberg, portrayed by Ryan Reynolds in the 2015 drama “Woman in Gold.” Schoenberg petitioned the court to order the warrant unsealed after the FBI refused his initial Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to release it to the public.
On Oct. 28 FBI Director James Comey sent a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee announcing that the Bureau was reopening the investigation into Clinton’s use of a private email server.
It was later revealed that the move came due to emails discovered on the computer from Weiner, but on Nov. 6 — two days before the presidential election — Comey sent another letter stating the FBI had “not changed our conclusions” that Clinton should not face charges for her use of a private email server while she was Secretary of State.
Clinton supporters have repeatedly blamed Comey for the Democratic candidate’s loss to Donald Trump.