Will Hillary Clinton collapse because of the FBI investigation?

The FBI's announcement of a further investigation into Clinton's email scandal has caused her popularity to plummet, while Trump's popularity has risen sharply.

The gap between the number of people supporting Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Trump is clearly decreasing. Photo: AP.

A week ago, the race for the White House was almost decided with an overwhelming advantage in favor of Hillary Clinton, after a series of scandals by Donald Trump. But the newly announced email investigation by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) could affect the election results, according to the Guardian.

Democrats are concerned that the new investigations into Clinton’s use of a private email server while she was secretary of state come at a difficult time, making it harder to prove her innocence with just a week to go before the election. And FBI Director James Comey’s letter to congressional officials highlighted a series of revelations that have already severely eroded Clinton’s lead.

The impetus for Mr Trump’s comeback began with a series of emails that showed why Mrs Clinton risked so much to maintain control of her electronic communications. The emails, released by WikiLeaks, were linked to John Podesta, the head of Mrs Clinton’s campaign. The contents of the emails have been leaked for weeks, with the content embarrassing the Democratic campaign.

A Guardian article appeared to shed light on the Clinton family’s shady business, charitable and political interests in the middle of last week. The information only concerned former President Bill Clinton, but it provided an opportunity for Donald Trump’s supporters to attack Hillary Clinton, who had struggled to divert attention from his tax scandals and his inappropriate behavior with women.

This year’s US presidential election was described as a no-confidence contest, so it didn’t take much to change the attitudes of independent voters. By October 28, bad news about Clinton and silence about Trump had cut Clinton’s lead in the polls in half from the time after the third presidential debate.

"When the attention was on Trump, Clinton won. Now all the attention will be on Clinton," said political expert Frank Luntz. He predicted that this year's victory will belong to the person who can shift public attention to the opponent.

Polls before October 30 showed Clinton still leading by 3.4 percentage points. Bill Clinton’s lead had shrunk from 11 points to just 3 points in the two weeks before the 1992 election, but he still won by double that margin.

But what worries Democrats is that there hasn't been much polling since the FBI email investigation was announced.

An ABC News/Washington Post poll on October 30 showed Clinton leading by just one point. The FBI's information reinforced voters' previous assessment and affected the gap between the two candidates.

"Nearly a third of respondents said they were less supportive of Clinton after the FBI director's statement. All else considered, 63 percent said the information made no difference," said pollster Gary Langer.

Only 7% of Clinton supporters felt the investigation would change the outcome of the election. But that number jumped among groups of voters who decided not to vote for Hillary Clinton.

These numbers are enough to worry the Clinton campaign. Moreover, Trump's support base has been growing in the past week, after criticism of him gradually decreased.

The FBI’s announcement, while not enough to sway voters, could solidify their views and influence the outcome of the race. This was shown in a survey of 13 battleground states. The CBS poll found that only 5% of Democrats said the issue made it harder for them to support Clinton, compared to more than 25% of Republicans. This explains why Democrats were quick to demand that the FBI let Clinton off the hook.

Clinton loyalists insist that the emails found on the computers of aide Huma Abedin and her husband Anthony Weiner were not related to the election. Even if more classified information was found to have been sent through the private server, it would not change the FBI’s previous determination that criminal charges against Clinton would be unfair without evidence of motive or a conspiracy to cover up the incident.

However, suspicions that the FBI is seeing things differently have been raised. Some studies show that only 11% of voters believe Hillary Clinton is honest and trustworthy, while the figure is 16% for Donald Trump.

"The FBI investigation is unlikely to change the balance of supporters of the two current candidates. But running for the White House while facing the risk of criminal investigation is really not good at all," said Guardian writer Dan Roberts.

According to VNE