Source: Comey thought it was too political to say Russians were meddling in election

If this report pans out, then there’s a new twist to all the talk about whether FBI Director James Comey was making an intentionally political move by releasing news that the FBI had found evidence of emails that might or might not be from Hillary Clinton and might or might not be new to the investigation of her private server. In this scenario, Comey suddenly gets a lot less benefit of the doubt:

FBI Director James Comey argued privately that it was too close to Election Day for the United States government to name Russia as meddling in the U.S. election and ultimately ensured that the FBI's name was not on the document that the U.S. government put out, a former FBI official tells CNBC. [...]

According to the former official, Comey agreed with the conclusion the intelligence community came to: "A foreign power was trying to undermine the election. He believed it to be true, but was against putting it out before the election." Comey's position, this official said, was "if it is said, it shouldn't come from the FBI, which as you'll recall it did not." 

So … “we have concluded that another country is for sure trying to influence our election” isn’t suitable for public consumption, but “there may be some emails, we’re not really sure” is something to release immediately? That does not make Comey look like the principled straight shooter he keeps getting credit for being. And it gives new credence to Harry Reid’s letter charging Comey with covering up evidence of a connection between the Russian government and Donald Trump.