by Guy Benson | Feb 05, 2016 at Townhall

Team Clinton seized on this report yesterday, claiming it was an email scandal “game-changer” that shifts the terrain of a controversy that has plagued Hillary’s campaign for months. It is, and does, nothing of the sort, for reasons we’ll address in a moment. First, the basics, via Politico:

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell said the FBI has contacted him about his use of personal email when he was the nation’s top diplomat, as a review conducted by the State Department inspector general concluded that Powell and former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice both received classified information through private email accounts…The State Department inquiry identified 10 messages sent to Rice’s immediate staff that were classified and two sent to Powell, according to Rep. Elijah Cummings of Maryland, the ranking member on the House Oversight and Benghazi committees. The emails, Cummings said, appear to have no classification markings, and it is still unclear if the content of the emails was or should have been considered classified when the emails were originally written and sent. In an interview with POLITICO Thursday. Powell vigorously disputed the sensitivity of the information sent to him through personal email, but he acknowledged the law enforcement interest in his email routine. “The FBI has come to us,” Powell said. Two FBI agents visited Powell in December for a discussion an aide described as a casual conversation about email practices during his term as secretary from 2001 to 2005…Powell seemed exasperated by State’s latest claim. The agency has designated the two messages “Confidential,” which is the lowest tier of classification. “Now, 11 or 12 years later, as part of a whole process of reviewing things somebody in the department says, ‘Well, they’re classified.’ My response to that is no they were not,” Powell said. ” You can say your judgment is they should have been classified but at the time they were not classified.