By Amber Phillips, The Washington Post In the past 24 hours, two high-profile figures from opposite sides of the political spectrum have accused FBI Director James Comey of potentially and illegally influencing the presidential election. Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., threw out the accusation in a letter Sunday night, and former Bush White House ethics lawyer Richard Painter said the same thing in a New York Times op-ed published Sunday. Their line in the sand: The Hatch Act, a Depression-era law that prohibits government employees from using their taxpayer-funded office to play politics.