RUTHFULLY YOURS

The Clinton camp has been insisting for weeks that the FBI’s probe into Hillary Clinton’s secret email server is just a minor “civil investigation,” but according to a Fox News report Friday afternoon, the ”extremely serious” investigation is being led by an “FBI A-team” and centers on a section of the Espionage Act known as 18 US Code 793.

A separate source, who also was not authorized to speak on the record, said the FBI will further determine whether Clinton should have known, based on the quality and detail of the material, that emails passing through her server contained classified information regardless of the markings. The campaign’s standard defense and that of Clinton is that she “never sent nor received any email that was marked classified” at the time.

It is not clear how the FBI team’s findings will impact the probe itself. But the details offer a window into what investigators are looking for — as the Clinton campaign itself downplays the controversy.

The FBI offered no comment, citing the ongoing investigation.

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A leading national security attorney, who recently defended former CIA officer Jeffrey Sterling in a leak investigation, told Fox News that violating the Espionage Act provision in question is a felony and pointed to a particular sub-section.

 ”Under [sub-section] F, the documents relate to the national defense, meaning very closely held information,” attorney Edward MacMahon Jr. explained. “Somebody in the government, with a clearance and need to know, then delivered the information to someone not entitled to receive it, or otherwise moved it from where it was supposed to be lawfully held.”

Meanwhile…

Stray voltage alert: Hillary Clinton out on the campaign trail today accuses Republicans of wanting to round up illegal immigrants and put them in “boxcars.”