The Latest:
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Latest on explosive devices sent to former President Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, CNN and others (all times local):
9:30 p.m.
The FBI is confirming that two additional suspicious packages, addressed to Rep. Maxine Waters, have been intercepted that are similar in appearance to five others that were received.
The FBI updated its tally in a tweet Wednesday night.
It came as federal authorities said a package addressed to Waters with similar markings and characteristics to the other devices was intercepted at a Los Angeles mail facility.
Earlier in the day, Waters said her Washington office was the target of a suspicious package, though it wasn’t immediately clear if that was related to the others.
Authorities say pipe bombs addressed to Hillary Clinton, former President Barack Obama, former CIA director John Brennan and former Attorney General Eric Holder have also been intercepted in recent days.
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9:15 p.m.
A law enforcement official says the pipe bombs that were sent to several prominent Democrats and CNN were packed with powder and shards of glass.
The official says the devices were made from PVC pipe that was about six inches long and covered with black tape.
The official says each device also had a small battery, similar to a watch battery. The official didn’t say whether the powder was explosive.
The official, who viewed X-ray images of the device, wasn’t authorized to discuss an ongoing investigation and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
The FBI has said the packages containing the explosives were sent to former President Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, former Attorney General Eric Holder, billionaire George Soros and CNN.
— Colleen Long
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8:30 p.m.
A package addressed to Rep. Maxine Waters appears similar to bombs sent to prominent Democrats in New York and Washington, D.C., and has been intercepted at a Los Angeles mail facility.
That’s according to a law enforcement official who said the package has similar markings and characteristics to five others that had been discovered this week.
The official wasn’t authorized to discuss an ongoing investigation and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
The five other packages all contained pipe bombs and targeted Hillary Clinton, former President Barack Obama, CNN and others.
Waters, a California Democrat, said earlier Wednesday her Washington office, too, was the target of a suspicious package.
That package was intercepted at a facility that processes congressional mail. It wasn’t immediately clear if that was related to the others.
— Michael Balsamo
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7:50 p.m.
A law enforcement official says tests have determined that a powder found inside an envelope delivered to CNN along with a pipe bomb was harmless.
The official wasn’t authorized to discuss the investigation publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
New York City’s police commissioner said earlier Wednesday that the package sent to CNN’s offices in Manhattan contained a live explosive and an envelope containing white powder.
The FBI said the package was similar to explosives sent to former President Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, former Attorney General Eric Holder and billionaire George Soros.
The package sent to CNN was addressed to former CIA Director John Brennan, a frequent guest on the channel. The official says that parcel contained no note or claim of responsibility.
— Tom Hays
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7:35 p.m.
Former CIA Director John Brennan says he may have been targeted because he’s a strong Trump administration critic, after an explosive addressed to him was mailed to CNN’s New York bureau.
Speaking at an Austin event Wednesday night, Brennan said he’d “been contacted by folks in the security realm” who are investigating the explosives. He didn’t elaborate.
Brennan says, “If I and others are being targeted because we’re speaking out” it’s “a very unfortunate turn of events.”
A frequent Trump critic, Brennan is actually an analyst for NBC News, not CNN.
He says, “Donald Trump too often has helped to incite these acts of violence” but “I’m hoping that maybe this is a turning point.”
Original Story:
WASHINGTON (AP) — The packages arrived in familiar manila envelopes affixed with lots of stamps, some bearing the American flag. But what was inside was alarming: crude pipe bombs wrapped in black tape, with wires sprouting from each end.
None of the explosives detonated, and no one was hurt. But authorities quickly launched a wide-ranging investigation into the devices that targeted multiple Democrats — including two former presidents — and foes of President Donald Trump’s administration ahead of the Nov. 6 midterm elections.
Here’s what we know:
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HILLARY CLINTON AND TWO FORMER PRESIDENTS
All the confirmed bombs appeared to come from the same person or persons, said John Miller, the New York Police Department’s head of intelligence and counterterrorism, who briefed reporters in New York.
The Secret Service intercepted a bomb addressed to Hillary Clinton at the Chappaqua, New York, home she shares with former President Bill Clinton, and another that was sent to former President Obama at his home with Michelle Obama in Washington.
Neither the Clintons nor the Obamas received the packages, and none had been at risk of receiving them because of screening procedures, the Secret Service said.
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CNN
A bomb squad removed another device from CNN’s New York headquarters, which was evacuated.
Overhead TV shots showed that device, which law enforcement officials said was linked to the other explosives, being driven away. The package contained a live explosive and an envelope with white powder, and the substance was being tested to see if it was dangerous, authorities said.
Two law enforcement officials, speaking to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation, said the device was crude but operational. It was addressed to former CIA Director John Brennan, who regularly appears as a television contributor and who has publicly clashed with Trump.
Trump and his aides routinely criticize CNN over its coverage, and the president calls the network an example of “fake news.”
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GEORGE SOROS
A suspicious device was found Monday at the New York compound of billionaire George Soros, a major contributor to Democratic causes. A U.S. official told the AP that investigators believe the explosive discovered near the Clintons’ home was linked to the one at the compound.
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DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ
All of the envelopes listed Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz as the return address. The FBI also said it was responding to a report of a suspicious package at one of Schultz’s offices in Florida.
She is the former chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee who was accused by Clinton rivals of secretly boosting the former secretary of state to the party’s 2016 presidential nomination.
The envelopes, only a few inches long, had typed letters and six stamps that bore no cancellation mark.
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MAXINE WATERS
Rep. Maxine Waters said her Washington office was also the target of a suspicious package. It was not immediately clear if that package was related to the other devices.
The outspoken Democrat is frequently criticized by Trump. He has called her “an extremely low IQ person” and has pegged her level of intellect as “somewhere in the mid-60s,” which is considered the range for a mental disability. She has called him “the poster boy for what a mob protester looks like.”
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WHAT WE DON’T KNOW
How dangerous the bombs were. It’s unclear what, if anything, was inside the pipes. Also unclear is whether they were actually processed through the mail or delivered some other way. Officials on Wednesday did not know if there are other devices out there, undelivered.
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“MOB” POLITICS
The discovery of the devices comes at a tense time, with Republicans and Democrats casting each other as a “mob” that would do anything to win or keep control of Congress in two weeks.
Trump has a history of advising supporters to “knock the hell out of” protesters and saying that he would like to see opponents carried out “on a stretcher.” Last weekend, he said at a rally in Montana that a congressman who had body-slammed a reporter was his kind of guy.
As the scope and targets of the device deliveries became clear, Trump called them “despicable acts.”
“Acts or threats of political violence of any kind have no place in the United States of America,” he said Wednesday during an event at the White House.
“This egregious conduct is abhorrent to everything we hold dear and sacred as Americans,” he added. “We’re extremely angry and upset and unhappy about what we witnessed this morning, and we will get to the bottom of it.”
