the 2008 presidential election, the Associated Press reported that Zeituni Onyango, half-aunt of Democratic candidate Barack Obama, was living as an illegal immigrant in Boston. She had been denied asylum and ordered to leave the United States in 2004. Some have also described the October 2008 record rise in unemployment as an "October Surprise". 2012: Obama vs. Romney Hurricane Sandy was labeled the October surprise by some in the media. Republican New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, who had been a staunch critic of President Barack Obama, was seen praising the response of the Obama administration. 2014 midterm elections The Ebola virus epidemic was considered an October surprise by some media outlets. 2016: Clinton vs. Trump On October 7, a recording from 2005 was released in which Republican Party nominee Donald Trump, using explicit language, claimed "when you're a star, they let you do it. You can do anything... Grab them by the pussy. You can do anything". Several politicians from both major parties expressed their disapproval of these remarks. Trump, who had been accused of sexism on several occasions before, later apologized for these remarks, saying they "don't reflect who I am". But the remarks led to many Republicans withdrawing their endorsement from Trump including Arizona Senator John McCain, New Hampshire Senator Kelly Ayotte, and Carly Fiorina. Many others who had not previously endorsed him asked him to step aside as the Republican nominee, including former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. The same day, WikiLeaks began a two-month campaign of releasing emails and excerpts from the account of John Podesta. They would later become known as the Podesta Leaks. They shed a negative light on Democratic Party nominee Hillary Clinton and included recordings of excerpts of speeches given by Clinton to a variety of banks, a debate question being leaked to Clinton prior to the debate, a stance on trade-deals different from those purported by Clinton during her campaign, along with her belief that it is beneficial to hold both public and private beliefs. Also on the same day, U.S. intelligence agencies publicly accused the Russian government of using computer hacking to interfere with the election process. Three weeks later, on October 28, then-FBI Director James Comey announced in a letter to Congress that he would take "appropriate investigative steps" to review additional emails related to Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server. This was announced after newly discovered