House Speaker Paul Ryan (R., Wis.) slammed the FBI on Tuesday for acting like "political operators" by releasing Hillary Clinton’s FBI report the Friday before Labor Day weekend.
"It’s like the most buried time you could put out stories. I’m surprised. I mean, I can’t believe they would do what is such a patently political move. It makes them look like political operators versus law enforcement officers," Ryan told Wisconsin’s WRNJ radio station Tuesday morning, according to the Hill.
"The fact that they chose the Friday before Labor Day to put all this out there mystifies me as to why they thought that was a smart thing to do," Ryan added.
The 58-page report released Friday by the FBI revolved around the bureau’s investigation of Hillary Clinton’s private email server and contained notes from its three-hour interview with the Democratic presidential nominee. The documents show Clinton used the phrase does not "recall" or "remember" at least 39 times during her FBI interview.
The Justice Department declined to press charges against the former secretary for mishandling classified material over her server, despite FBI Director James Comey calling Clinton’s actions "extremely careless" in July.
Ryan held Comey in high regard during his radio interview, saying he was a credible guy while adding he did not agree with the director’s recommendation to not charge Clinton.
Ryan said Clinton was the last person he wants to see become president.
"I think she has real trust issues, real credibility issues," he said.
"What she said she did with respect to her emails, her devices, and all the rest versus now the facts as we know them as released in the Friday data dump," Ryan said.
Clinton used thirteen different devices for her personal email during her tenure as secretary of state, according to the FBI report.