that post came in the middle of a series of tweets from rep. jeff duncan.  | ap photo by louis nelson 10/17/16 07:57 pm edt updated 10/17/16 07:59 pm edt a south carolina congressman praised wikileaks, the organization responsible for releasing thousands of pages of hacked emails from high-ranking u.s. political officials, for finally drawing scrutiny onto the record of democratic presidential nominee hillary clinton. daily batches of emails from clinton campaign chairman john podesta have offered an insight into the inner workings of the former secretary of state<u+2019>s white house bid and have made public, among other things, transcripts of paid speeches clinton delivered after leaving the state department. while the emails have been illuminating, that they are believed to have been obtained via hacking by the russian government has made them controversial. story continued below but for republican rep. jeff duncan, the ends justify the means. <u+201c>let me be clear: thank god for wikileaks,<u+201d> duncan wrote on twitter monday morning. <u+201c>doing the job that msm won't! #assange #wikileaks.<u+201d> that post came in the middle of a series of tweets from duncan, who earlier remarked that it was <u+201c>crazy that public opinion is being driven this election cycle by an accused rapist hiding out in the embassy of foreign country #wikileaks.<u+201d> julian assange, wikileaks<u+2019> founder, has been inside the ecuadorian embassy in london since 2012, avoiding extradition to sweden in relation to a rape allegation. <u+201c>not praise for assange. thankful info is out there for sure, but never have condoned illegal activity. maybe if hrc hadn't destroyed emails,<u+201d> duncan wrote on twitter, finishing his thought with a second tweet. <u+201c>and if fbi had not destroyed evidence & all emails turned over <u+2014> we would have a clear picture without wiki.<u+201d> while the u.s. government has officially accused russia of being behind other cyberattacks against the u.s. political officials, white house press secretary josh earnest said last week that he could not conclusively tie the hacked podesta emails to the russian government because they were not made public until after the intelligence assessment of the previous attacks was released. he did say that emails hacked by the russian government in the past have been released by wikileaks. cybersecurity by darren samuelsohn <u+201c>and - msm major networks seem to be in collusion with hrc camp - failing to report on the whole story. but quick to jump on a tweet for sure,<u+201d> duncan added monday morning. msm is a reference to mainstream media; hrc refers to clinton. later monday, a spokesman for duncan offered a further explanation of the congressman's twitter posts in a statement to the charleston, south carolina, post and courier . the spokesman said duncan "does not condone any illegal hacking <u+2014> end of story." <u+201c>his point is that americans expect oversight of the executive branch and powerful officials," the statement read. "tragically, the critical media counterweight against the abuse of power <u+2014> which makes a government by and for the people possible <u+2014> is being tilted to one side by those who are connected and in power for their own personal gain.<u+201d> <u+201c>it<u+2019>s unfortunate that illegal hacking is what exposed [clinton<u+2019>s] impropriety and collusion with the media," it continued. "unfortunate because that only emboldens more distrust of america<u+2019>s leaders and media elites.<u+201d> by michael grunwald by bill scher by thomas wright by joshua zeitz
rep. duncan: thank god for wikileaks - politico
louis nelson darren samuelsohn michael grunwald