Cory Booker and James Clapper sent suspicious packages becoming latest Trump critics targeted

FBI are focusing their investigation on Florida, with 12 explosive devices or suspicious packages now sent around the country

Authorities are investigating suspicious packages addressed to Senator Cory Booker and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, the 11th and 12th package or explosive device sent to prominent Democrats and critics of Donald Trump.

The package addressed to the Democratic senator from New Jersey was found at a mail sorting facility in Florida, the FBI said on Twitter.

The New York package was addressed to former Mr Clapper, but included the CNN office address. That package comes two days after a package addressed to former CIA Director John Brennan via CNN was found in the news network's office building.

Responding to the news, Mr Clapper said he had "every confidence" in the federal officials investigating the spate of threats.

“I think anyone who has...publicly been a critic of President Trump needs to take precautions...but at the same time we can’t get too overwhelmed about it, too overwrought is the right word,” the former intelligence chief said.

“I have every confidence in all the law enforcement involved,” Mr Clapper said.

The latest packages after a Miami-Dade Police bomb squad searched a postal facility in Opa-Locka, northwest of Miami late on Thursday as part of the investigation into the spate of bombs sent across the country..

It is believed that investigators have turned their attention to Florida,with Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen confirming that at least some of the packages were mailed in in the state. “Some of the packages went through the mail. They originated, some of them, from Florida,” she told Fox News. “I am confident that this person or people will be brought to justice.”

The new discoveries mean that 10 vocal critics of Mr Trump have been targeted by at least 12 packages. All were intercepted and there have been no injuries.

At a press conference on Thursday, officials in New York would not discuss possible motives or details on how the packages found their way into the US postal system. Nor would they say why none of the packages had detonated, but they stressed they were still treating them as “live devices”.

“As far as a hoax device, we’re not treating it that way,” said Police Commissioner James O’Neill. The case is being treated as domestic terrorism.

The first was found in the post box of billionaire businessman George Soros. Packages were also sent to a New York home of Hillary and Bill Clinton and to Mr Obama and Congresswoman Maxine Waters in Washington DC. A second package addressed to California Democrat Ms Waters was found in Los Angeles.

CNN’s New York office was evacuated on Wednesday morning after a package addressed to former CIA director John Brennan was found in a mailroom that serves the office. In Florida, another package was discovered that was addressed to former attorney general Eric Holder.

Two packages for fomer Vice President Joe Biden were intercepted in Delaware, the FBI said, while another was received at a building housing a restaurant and production company owned by actor Robert De Niro in New York City. Investigators said they matched parcels which contained pipe bombs sent to former president Barack Obama and several other Democrats this week.

The packages are being analysed by the FBI at its laboratory in Quantico, Virginia, with authorities reluctant to go public with more than board patterns.

At least five of the packages, including the one sent to Mr Soros, involved manila envelopes addressed to prominent Trump critics and carried a similar arrangement of labelling and US postage stamps. The Florida address of Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz was listed as the return address of most of the packages.

At the press conference on Thursday, John Miller, the New York Police Department’s deputy commissioner for intelligence and counterterrorism, said that authorities “don’t know” yet if other devices were on the way to being delivered and urged Americans to remain vigilant.