US Justice Dept trying hard to protect Hillary: Donald Trump

Washington: Donald Trump on Sunday accused the US Department of Justice of trying "hard" to protect Democratic presidential rival Hillary Clinton in the email controversy, a day after the FBI launched a probe into a new cache of emails just days ahead of the November 8 election.

"Now it's reported today that the Department of Justice was fighting the FBI and that's because the Department of Justice is trying so hard to protect Hillary," Trump, 70, told his supporters at an election rally in Colorado, adding that such things happen only in third world country.

"We are living in a third-world country. This has never happened before. This is the lowest point in terms of our judicial system. This is the lowest point in the history of our country. On November 8th, we are going to change things," he said.

At another rally in Phoenix, Arizona, Trump said a vote for Hillary is a vote to surrender our government to public corruption, graft and cronyism that threatens the survival of our Constitutional system itself.

"What makes us exceptional is that we are a nation of laws, and that we are all equal under those laws? Hillary's corruption shreds the principle on which our nation was founded," he said.

"When the outcome is fixed, when the system is rigged, people lose hope they stop dreaming, they stop trying. When the powerful can get away with anything, because they have the money and the connections to rig the system, then people lose confidence in our laws and in our future," he said.

Americans, he said, have one ultimate check on Hillary's corruption and that is the power of voting. The Republican candidate for the White House also said that Clinton has nobody to blame but herself for her mounting legal troubles.

"Hillary has nobody to blame but herself for her mounting legal troubles. Her criminal action was willful, deliberate, intentional and purposeful," he said.

Calling the email scandal, "the biggest political scandal since Watergate" Trump alleged that Hillary set up an illegal server for the obvious purpose of shielding her criminal conduct from public disclosure and exposure.

Trump made the comments after FBI director James Comey announced to reopen Hillary's email probe after the agency discovered a new batch of emails linked to her, to see if they contained classified material.

A previous FBI probe in the matter was declared finished in July.

Hillary, who is still the favourite to win the presidential election on November 8, has called the FBI's decision "unprecedented" and "deeply troubling."

"It's pretty strange to put something like that out with such little information right before an election," she has complained at a rally in Florida.