US Secretary of State John Kerry has called this year’s presidential election “embarrassing,” saying his job as the country’s top diplomat has become more difficult.

“There are moments when it is downright embarrassing,” Kerry told students at an event with Mayor of London Sadiq Khan during a visit to Britain on Monday. “This election has been difficult for our country’s perception abroad.”

He made the remarks as the campaigns of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton were struggling with several controversies.

Trump has been under fire over his lewd and humiliating remarks about women while Clinton has been getting a lot of flak over her use of a private email during her tenure as secretary of state.

Last month, a 2005 audiotape was released of Trump’s comments about groping and kissing women without consent, which profoundly affected his campaign.

Clinton’s favorability has also decreased dramatically since FBI Director James Comey’s Friday move, which has led to revival of an investigation into Clinton’s email scandal.

Meanwhile, the business mogul has called the country’s election process “rigged”, with Clinton saying that he is straying into authoritarianism.

“There are times when it steps out of any norm that I’ve known — and I ran for president in 2004,” Kerry said. “I could never imagine debates that were not focused on real issues, so it’s been a real change.” “The way it’s made it difficult for me is that, you know, when you sit down with some foreign ministers in another country, or a prime minister of another country, and you say ‘hey, you know we really want you to move more authoritatively towards democracy’, they look at you…They’re polite but you can see the question in their head and in their eyes and in their expression. It’s hard.”

According to an ABC News/Washington Post Tracking Poll released Monday, 59 percent of registered voters have an unfavorable view of Clinton, and an identical percentage of voters dislike Trump.

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The FBI director acted against the wishes of the top US justice official when he sent a letter to Congress, notifying lawmakers about the review of newly-discovered emails “pertinent” to the probe of presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s private email server, a new report says.

Citing a government official who requested anonymity, Washington-based news outlet The Hill reported Saturday that James Comey ignored the advice of Attorney General (AG) Loretta Lynch when he wrote to US congressional leaders on Friday about reopening an investigation into the Democratic nominee’s email communications.

“The Justice Department’s stance was to abstain from taking any actions that could impact the presidential race,” said the unnamed official. “The AG’s position is consistent with the department’s position not to take investigative steps that would influence an election so close to an election and not to comment on ongoing investigations. Director Comey decided to operate independently of that guidance by sending that letter to The Hill.”

The official further emphasized that while Lynch and Comey did not discuss the matter directly, “the position of the department was made clear to the FBI.”

‘Keeping Congress in dark misleading to Americans’

Comey, however, wrote  a note to his staff prior to sending the letter to Congress saying, “Of course, we don’t ordinarily tell Congress about ongoing investigations, but here I feel I also think it would be misleading to the American people were we not to supplement the record.”

In the letter to the leaders of congressional oversight committees, the FBI chief wrote, “In connection with an unrelated case, the FBI has learned of the existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the investigation. I am writing to inform you that the investigative team briefed me on this yesterday, and I agreed that the FBI should take appropriate investigative steps designed to allow investigators to review these emails to determine whether they contain classified information, as well as to assess their importance to our investigation.”

He further added, “The FBI cannot yet assess whether or not this material may be significant, and I cannot predict how long it will take us to complete this additional work.” While Democrats blasted Comey for not being forthcoming in his letter, leaving Clinton exposed to innuendo around the lingering probe from her detractors, the Republicans abruptly capitalized on the opportunity to renew criticism of Clinton’s use of a private email server.

Comey’s move ‘appalling’

Veteran Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein of California censured Comey’s move as “appalling” in a statement, adding, “Without knowing how many emails are involved, who wrote them, when they were written or their subject matter, it’s impossible to make any informed judgment on this development.”

“However, one thing is clear,” she emphasized. “Director Comey’s announcement played right into the political campaign of Donald Trump, who is already using the letter for political purposes; and all of this just 11 days before the election.”

This is while the Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump spoke about Comey’s letter to Congress at his rally in Manchester, New Hamshire, calling his Democratic rival corrupt and a criminal.

“Hillary Clinton’s corruption is on a scale we have never seen before,” he said. “We must not let her take her criminal scheme into the Oval Office.” Meanwhile, the Republican National Committee stated that the FBI’s move shortly before the Election Day “shows how serious this discovery must be” and “raises serious questions about what records may have been turned over and why.”

Moreover, Republican Speaker of the House Paul Ryan announced in a statement that he is renewing his call for the director of national intelligence to suspend classified briefings for Clinton “until this matter is fully resolved.” Trump, meanwhile, also  ripped the Justice Department on Saturday over reports that it had warned the FBI against publicly acknowledging new emails potentially related to Clinton’s email probe so close to the presidential poll.

 He further argued during a rally in Colorado that Justice Department officials were “fighting” to stop the FBI chief from sending the letter to lawmakers. “The Department of Justice is trying so hard to protect Hillary,” Trump said to boos from the audience. “This is what we mean when we call it a rigged system.”

Trump further cited a reported survey earlier in the week that found that 97 percent of political donations from employees at the Justice Department by the end of September went to Clinton, saying it was evidence that authorities at the department were biased in favor of his rival.

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US Republican vice presidential candidate Mike Pence says the mainstream media is biased against Donald Trump, and there are “many instances” of voter fraud in the run up to the November 8 election. Republican presidential nominee Trump has recently intensified his criticism of the American electoral system. He calls the election process rigged, and says the media is colluding with Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in order to win the White House.

He has questioned the legitimacy of the US elections, saying that he believed the vote was already being “rigged” at many polling places. During his final presidential debate with Clinton last week, Trump declared that he might not accept the results of the November 8 presidential election if there is evidence it was rigged.

In an interview with CBS News on Friday, Trump’s running mate, Pence, said, “Make no mistake about it, there are many instances in our lifetimes of voter fraud in individual polling places and in certain jurisdictions.” “Donald Trump and I are just calling on people to respectfully participate in the electoral process. We want a victory on Election Day, but we also want it to be a victory for American democracy,” he stated.

The governor of Indiana rejected claims of critics that Trump’s “rigging” rhetoric may encourage violence by his supporters if he loses the presidential election.

“We certainly would denounce any calls for anything other people being vigorously involved in the electoral process,” he said. “I have to tell you, I really don’t see it. The people that rallying around our team, rallying around our cause, love this country, are passionate about this country and are anxious to see change,” the GOP vice presidential nominee stated.

He went on to accuse the media of unfairly backing Clinton. “The level of negative coverage about my running mate in many quarters in the national media has just been overwhelming compared to any negative coverage or frankly the avalanche of scandals coming out of Hillary Clinton’s years as secretary of State,” Pence said.

According to a recent poll released, 41 percent of American voters are saying the 2016 election could be “stolen” from Trump due to widespread voter fraud.

And 73 percent of Republican voters think the election could be stolen from the billionaire businessman, while 17 percent of Democrats agree with the prospect of rigging.

American writer and political commentator Stephen Lendman said on October 17 Washington has been rigging elections for nearly 200 years in order to keep anti-establishment candidates away from the White House.

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US Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump says President Barack Obama should be “investigated” over his role in Hillary Clinton’s private email scandal.

Trump said Tuesday that Obama knew about Clinton’s email arrangements while she served as secretary of state during the president’s first term in office from 2009 to 2013.

“That’s why he stuck up for Hillary, because he didn’t want to be dragged in. Because he knew all about her private server,” Trump told Reuters. “This means that he has to be investigated.”

The White House did not give any comments about Trump’s accusations, but Press Secretary Josh Earnest said earlier on Tuesday that Obama did not know where Clinton’s server had been located or other details, although he did have her personal email address.

Clinton has said her decision to use the private server installed at her home at Chappaqua, New York, for official government business was a mistake and has apologized.

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Early voting has begun in a number of US states two weeks ahead of Election Day after more than 18 months of intensive battle between Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump.

Thirty-six states and Washington, DC, offer some form of early voting. According to the rules in those states, voters can cast their ballots before Election Day without having to give an excuse to vote early. In addition, unlike standard voting, voters are not bound to a specific location for early voting.

Americans started voting Monday in Alaska, Arkansas, Massachusetts, Texas, Wisconsin, Colorado, and some parts of Florida, with the last three states being some of the battleground ones up for grabs.

In Harris County, Texas, 15,205 ballots were cast during the first 2.5 hours of early voting, the Harris County Clerk’s office said, adding, the number is equal to one third of the total cast all day on the first day of early voting in 2012, about 47,000.

In Broward County, Florida, over 18,840 residents voted at early voting sites by 3 pm, according to the elections office. “I think people are excited about the presidential election,” said Susan Bucher, elections supervisor for Palm Beach County. “We hope it keeps up like this.”

According to local media outlets, more voters have been choosing an early option in recent election cycles. Up to 40% of voters may go for early voting this year, CBS News estimated.

According to a recent poll, Clinton holds a 12-point lead over Trump nationally, with the business mogul campaign denouncing “biased” media surveys.

Clinton had the support of 50 percent of likely voters as opposed to Trump’s 38 percent, said the ABC News 2016 tracking poll released on Sunday.

Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson received 5 percent support among likely voters, while Green Party nominee Jill Stein got 2 percent, the poll showed.

Trump’s campaign said Sunday that the candidate would “break up the new media conglomerate oligopolies” if elected president and denounced Clinton as “the official candidate of the multinational ruling elite.” He has called the US election process rigged, saying that the media is colluding with Clinton in order to beat him.

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US Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton holds a 12-point lead over her Republican rival Donald Trump nationally, according to a new poll, but the Trump campaign denounces “biased” media surveys.

The former secretary of state has the support of 50 percent of likely voters, while the billionaire businessman has 38 percent support, claimed the ABC News 2016 tracking poll released on Sunday.

Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson has 5 percent support among likely voters, while Green Party nominee Jill Stein has 2 percent support. According to ABC News, Clinton is at her highest level of support in any ABC News/Washington Post poll, while Trump is at his lowest.

Sixty-nine percent of likely voters reject Trump’s response to accusations about his alleged remarks about women, according to pollsters. Pollsters also claimed that 59 percent of voters disapprove of the billionaire’s claim that the election is rigged in favor of Clinton, and 65 percent dislike his comments that he might not accept vote results.

The poll was conducted from October 20 to 22 of 1,391 adults, including 874 likely voters. It has a margin of error of 3.5 percentage points. Trump rejects the polls coming from mainstream media outlets as fabricated and says the media wants to get Clinton as president at any cost.

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The majority of Republican voters in the United States think if Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton becomes president, it would be due to illegal voting or vote rigging, a new poll shows. According to the Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Friday, only half of Republicans would accept Clinton as their president and nearly 70 percent of them said a Clinton victory would be because of vote rigging.

On the contrary, 70 percent of Democratic voters said they would accept a victory by Republican nominee Donald Trump and less than 50 percent would attribute it to illegal voting or vote rigging, the poll showed. The poll shows a broad concern across the political spectrum about voter suppression, the actual vote count and ineligible voters casting ballots.

However, the Republicans feel that concern more. Eight out of ten Republicans are concerned about the accuracy of the final vote count, while about six out of ten Democrats are concerned about the vote count. Sixty percent of respondents, regardless of political party, said they are worried about issues such as voter intimidation and suppression.

The level of concern and mistrust in the system, especially among Republicans, is unprecedented, said Lonna Atkeson, a professor at the University of New Mexico and head of the Center for the Study of Voting, Elections, and Democracy. “I’ve never seen an election like this. Not in my lifetime. Certainly not in modern history.” The difference, she said, is Trump. “It has to be the candidate effect.”

The findings come after repeated statements by Trump that the media and the political establishment have rigged the election against him and he may not accept the election outcome if Clinton wins.

Trump’s claim that the presidential election is being rigged and his suggestion that he may not accept the result of the election if he loses has challenged a centerpiece of US democracy and outraged many Democrats and Republicans.

During a campaign rally on Friday in Cleveland, Ohio, Clinton called the New York businessman’s refusal unprecedented. “Now make no mistake: by doing that, he is threatening our democracy.”

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During the final US presidential debate with Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton on Wednesday night, Republican nominee Donald Trump declared that he might not accept the results of the November 8 presidential election if there is evidence it was rigged.

Press TV has asked two political analysts whether they thought the upcoming election in the US would be rigged as Trump has predicted. Richard Becker, with the ANSWER Coalition from San Francisco, said the election system in the United States is not based on who wins the popular vote. “It’s who wins the election in enough states to win the electoral votes of that state and the electoral votes are very unbalanced,” he said on Thursday night.

Becker agreed that the US elections are usually rigged, but thought that would happen in Trump’s favour this time around.  “The elections are rigged but in his (Trump’s) favor, in favor of the billionaires and the millionaires” or “those who could garner the support of billionaires and millionaires,” he said.

He also touched on the Republican nominee’s allegations about a biased media coverage of the election campaign in the United States. “The mass media is supporting Clinton to a large degree now but it’s been estimated that at least two billion maybe as much as three billion dollars in free media coverage came Trump’s way,” Becker said.

Brent Budowsky, a columnist at the top US political website The Hill, said he supports a direct election of the president by voters, and not the Electoral College. Budowsky, however, ruled out the claim that the 2016 presidential race would be rigged, saying Trump was resorting to “conspiracy theory” to justify his defeat in the upcoming election.

US Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton holds a 9-point lead over her Republican rival Donald Trump nationally, a new poll shows. The former secretary of state has the support of 47 percent of likely voters, while the billionaire businessman has 38 percent support, found the Bloomberg Politics poll, released on Wednesday. Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson has 8 percent support among likely voters, while Green Party nominee Jill Stein has 3 percent support. Clinton keeps her 9-point lead over Trump, 50 to 41 percent, in a head-to-head matchup.

She has a 4-point lead over Trump among likely voters without a college degree, 48 to 44 percent, while the billionaire trails by 13 points among whites with a college degree. The poll was conducted from October 14 to 17 among 1,006 likely voters. It has a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points. Clinton and Trump were literally tied in the Bloomberg poll in September, with 46 percent apiece in a two-way race.

Trump appears to be in freefall after the release of a 2005 audiotape earlier this month of his lewd comments about touching and kissing women without their consent. “Donald Trump’s chances of winning this election have faded,” said Democratic pollster Fred Yang of Hart Research Associates, which conducted this survey with Republican pollster Bill McInturff and his firm Public Opinion Strategies.

Trump rejects polls

However, Trump has rejected such claims and polls as fabricated by media outlets and organizations which want to elect Clinton as president at any cost.

Over the last week, Trump has intensified his criticism of the American electoral system. He called the election process rigged, and said the media is colluding with Clinton in order to beat him.

He has questioned the legitimacy of the US elections, saying that he believed the vote was already being “rigged” at many polling places.

Trump has stated that the November presidential election will determine whether America is a free nation, “or whether we have only the illusion of democracy, but are in fact controlled by a small handful of global special interests rigging the system.”

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US Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has repeated his assertion that the 2016 election is rigged, saying a “large-scale voter fraud” is taking place. Over the last week, Trump has intensified his criticism of the American electoral system. He called the election process rigged, and said the media is colluding with Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton in order to beat him.

On Monday, Trump called his party leaders naive for denying the vote rigging.  “Of course there is large scale voter fraud happening on and before Election Day,” the GOP nominee tweeted. “Why do Republican leaders deny what is going on? So naive!” he added.

Many Republicans, including House Speaker Paul Ryan, have rejected Trump’s claims, saying such voter fraud is impossible for the November election. They have warned that such allegations could cause unrest.

The White House also denounced Trump’s claim that the presidential election could be “rigged” against him. “Not at all,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said on Monday when asked whether the Obama administration is concerned the election could be stolen from the Republican nominee.

“The president is very confident in election officials in both parties in states all across the country” to ensure the elections are “conducted freely and fairly,” the spokesman said.

A day earlier, Trump strongly questioned the legitimacy of the US elections, saying that he believed the vote was already being “rigged” at many polling places.

“The election is absolutely being rigged by the dishonest and distorted media pushing Crooked Hillary – but also at many polling places – SAD,” Trump wrote on Twitter on Sunday.

According to a new poll released on Monday, 41 percent of American voters are now saying the 2016 presidential election could be “stolen” from Trump due to widespread voter fraud.

And 73 percent of Republican voters think the election could be stolen from the billionaire businessman, while 17 percent of Democrats agree with the prospect of rigging.

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