As the release of some 7,000 new emails brought a fresh headache for Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton, neurosurgeon Ben Carson caught up with Donald Trump in new poll to challenge his frontrunner status among Republicans.
But long shot Indian-American presidential contender Bobby Jindal, languishing at the bottom of the polls, boasted Monday that the real estate mogul's popularity is part of a "summer of silliness" and it was he would eventually emerge as the Republican nominee.
Clinton may not be in legal trouble yet, but the new emails with information redacted from 150 of them is bound to add fresh fuel to the controversy over the use of her own private server that has roiled her presidential campaign for over five months.
Information was redacted from her emails because it has now been deemed to require classification, the State Department said Monday night in releasing the material to meet a federal court direction to make public 25 percent of Clinton's emails by end August.
A State Department official said that the approximately 150 emails from Clinton's four year tenure as secretary of state that are being upgraded and subsequently classified are all at the "confidential" level - the lowest level of classification.
Newly-classified emails include correspondence Clinton had with an aide about an Iran speech she delivered at American University in 2010, and another from the minister counselor for public affairs in Pakistan with the subject "Facebook Freed in Pakistan," according to NBC News.
None are "Top Secret" as were two of the emails released last month, it said. In a 2010 note, Clinton asks colleague Philippe Reines if he can help her learn to use her new iPad, or "hPad," as Reines dubbed it.
Meanwhile, in the Republican camp, Carson caught up with Trump in Iowa, one of the first four nominating states in the party primary.
A new Monmouth University poll found the two tied at 23 percent. It was the first time since July 26 that a poll in the first four states to select a Republican nominee did not find Trump substantially ahead of all other candidates.
Farther behind Trump and Carson were former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, at 10 percent; Texas Senator Ted Cruz, at 9 percent; Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, at 7 percent and former Florida governor Jeb Bush at 5 percent.
Louisiana's Indian-American governor Jindal polled below one percent. Yet during a campaign stop at Storm Lake, Iowa, he suggested Trump's popularity is part of a "summer of silliness".
"We don't need another talker in the White House," said Jindal. "We need a doer, not a talker. So I think voters are going to focus on who can do this job."
Jindal said Trump and other candidates have tapped into frustrations that voters have with insiders in Washington.
Given his low poll numbers, Jindal may again be relegated to a separate second tier for CNN's live televised debate, in California, on September 16 as he was for the first on Fox News.
Some fun things in Hillary emails
It wasn't all serious stuff that Hillary Clinton was doing as America's top diplomat for years. There were a few fun things too as revealed by the latest cache of 7,000 emails released by the State Department.
For instance, in a March 5, 2010, email to Richard Verma, now the US ambassador to India, and another State Department staffer, Clinton asked: "Where are we on this?" about gefilte fish, the famously controversial Jewish delicacy.
The Time magazine citing Tablet magazine writer Yair Rosenberg said Clinton was asking about a blocked US shipment of carp to Israel.
In a February 27, 2010, email, a State Department help desk analyst asked if she could receive email.
Clinton's Indian American assistant Huma Abedin clarified in a follow-up that the help desk hadn't recognised Clinton's private address while troubleshooting.
"They had no idea it was YOU, just some random email address so they emailed," Abedin wrote.
In a January 3, 2010, email to State Department staffer Monica Hanley, Clinton asked when two TV shows aired -- "Parks and Recreation" and "The Good Wife".
"Can you give me times for two TV shows?" she asked.
In an August 20, 2010, email to a State Department staffer, movie producer Harvey Weinstein pushed for Clinton to watch "The King's Speech", his film about how King George overcame his stuttering problem.
"It's a fun movie that is much in the tradition of SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE, again I think you would both like it (and Hillary would approve because it's PG-13 with not too many swear words," he wrote.
Finally in a December 2010 email thread, Clinton, staffer Cheryl Mills and lawyer David Kendall joked about a news story about a man who robbed a bank wearing a Hillary mask.
"Should I be flattered? Even a little bit?" Clinton asked.
Mills dug into it and found 11 times bank robbers wore Richard Nixon masks "perhaps not surprisingly".
