Missing FBI agents' texts have been recovered, Justice Department says
The Justice Department’s inspector general told congressional leaders on Thursday that his office has recovered five months of missing text messages exchanged between two FBI officials who had criticized President Donald Trump.
Inspector General Michael Horowitz said his office had used forensic tools to recover the messages between FBI agent Peter Strzok and FBI lawyer Lisa Page, report the Washington Post, Reuters, ABC News and USA Today. The FBI had attributed the missing texts to misconfiguration issues.
Strzok was removed from the special counsel’s probe into Russian influence as a result of the texts. Trump had tweeted earlier this week that the missing texts were “one of the biggest stories in a long time,” Politico had reported.
In texts that were previously released, Page called Trump a “loathsome human.” Strzok had written that “I’m scared for our organization” if Trump is elected, and referred to Trump as a “douche.”
Horowitz is investigating the texts as part of an inquiry into how the FBI handled the investigation of Clinton emails and Russian interference in the election. In his letter on Thursday, he said he would not object if the Justice Department shares the texts with congressional committees.
