The Democratic National Committee (DNC) chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz has announced she is to step down from her post following the extensive email leak of some 19,000 messages from Democratic party officials.
According to various reports, a number of the emails (posted by Wikileaks on its disclosure website on Friday) detail the hostile split between the DNC and Hillary Clinton's former rival Senator Bernie Sanders; depict DNC officials as showing bias towards Clinton, mocking Sanders and his supporters and, in one instance, even going so far as to question his commitment to his Jewish faith.
In a statement to CNN the Florida congresswoman said she will leave the position after the DNC convention, being held this week in Philadelphia.
"Going forward, the best way for me to accomplish those goals [which include electing Clinton president] is to step down as Party Chair at the end of this convention," she said.
"As Party Chair, this week I will open and close the Convention and I will address our delegates about the stakes involved in this election not only for Democrats, but for all Americans," she originally added.
As it turns out, however, the DNC convention went ahead yesterday without Schultz following chaotic scenes in which she was loudly jeered by Bernie Sanders followers. Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, who is also the DNC's secretary, handled the gaveling in her place.
Whilst Wikileaks decided not to state exactly how it got its hands on the private material, many security experts have laid the blame with the Russian hackers who gained access to DNC computer systems some time ago, as reported by Fox News back in June.
“I believe the research that shows Russian state actors hacked into the DNC email servers and extracted the emails and other documents,” argued Leo Taddeo, chief security officer at Cryptzone, and former special agent in charge of the FBI's NY cybercrime division.
“There is a basis to believe Russian state actors passed some of the stolen material to Wikileaks to influence US policy towards Russia.”
However, continued Taddeo, contrary to sentiments made by Clinton, this is not a case of the Russian government trying to sway the US election in Republican candidate Donald Trump’s favor.
“Instead, Putin and his leadership are trying to influence Clinton and her future stance toward Europe's missile defenses and NATO expansion,” he said.
Wikileaks added that the emails it has made public are a part of its “new Hillary Leaks series”, suggesting we could be seeing similar sensitive information being released soon.