An FBI agent who worked on investigations into Democrat Hillary Clinton and President Donald Trump's campaign testified behind closed doors to a House committee today as GOP lawmakers stepped up efforts to highlight what they say is bias at the Justice Department.
Peter Strzok exchanged anti-Trump texts with a colleague, FBI attorney Lisa Page, as both worked on the Clinton investigation and briefly on special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into ties between Trump's campaign and Russia. House Republicans have seized on the texts as part of multiple investigations into the Justice Department, the FBI and decisions that both made during the 2016 presidential election.
In one of the texts, from August 2016, Strzok wrote, "We'll stop it," in reference to a potential Trump election win.
The barrage of GOP criticism against the Justice Department comes just a few months before the midterm elections, and amid intense sparring between the parties over Mueller's investigation.
Democrats have accused Republicans of trying to undermine Mueller's investigation for political gain.
President Donald Trump criticised the closed-door interview earlier with Strzok this week, saying that it should be "shown to the public on live television, not a closed door hearing that nobody will see."
House Judiciary Chairman Robert Goodlatte, R-Va., has said there will also be a public hearing with Strzok.
A seasoned counterintelligence agent, Strzok had a leading role on the investigation into whether Clinton illegally mishandled classified information through her use of a private email server while secretary of state.
He later joined Mueller's team investigating Russian election interference, but was reassigned last summer after the discovery of anti-Trump text messages he had traded with the FBI lawyer. Page had already left Mueller's team.
The Republicans' charges of bias were bolstered earlier this month by a report by the Justice Department's internal watchdog that faulted top department officials, including former FBI Director James Comey, for their handling of the probe of Clinton's emails. The report also detailed the communications by Strzok and others criticising Trump.
While strongly criticising the way the Clinton investigation was handled, the inspector general ultimately found no evidence that bias affected the decision not to bring charges against her.
Still, Strzok was recently escorted from the FBI building as his disciplinary process winds through the system, his lawyer has said. He "remains a proud FBI agent" who wants to serve his country but has been the "target of unfounded personal attacks, political games and inappropriate information leaks," according to a statement last week from lawyer Aitan Goelman.
The Strzok interview is one of several meetings this week in which House Republicans are criticizing the Justice Department. At a contentious session Tuesday, the GOP-led Judiciary panel approved a new resolution requesting the department provide documents, despite an existing agreement to do so that was announced by House Speaker Paul Ryan's office over the weekend.
Republican Reps Mark Meadows of North Carolina and Jim Jordan of Ohio, two vocal critics of the Clinton investigation, were behind the resolution, which could be considered on the House floor as soon as this week. Justice and FBI have already turned over more than 800,000 documents to congressional committees, but subpoenas from the Justice and Intelligence panels are demanding additional materials.
On Thursday, FBI Director Christopher Wray and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein will appear at an open hearing to testify about both investigations and the documents Republicans are seeking.
Goodlatte said he intends to use Thursday's hearing to question Wray and Rosenstein about complying with the requests and that he encouraged "others to do the same." Democrats angrily fought the resolution approved Tuesday, which is nonbinding but says the documents listed must be provided within two weeks.
"What is really going on here is a bad-faith effort by the majority to interfere in an ongoing investigation," said Rep. Jerrold Nadler of New York, the top Democrat on the Judiciary panel. Ryan and some other Republican leaders have made pains to disassociate the document requests from campaign politics or Mueller's probe, saying the House is conducting legitimate oversight.
But Republican Rep Matt Gaetz of Florida put politics front and center at Tuesday's meeting, ticking off several political polls that have shown decreasing support for Mueller.
"And just as Hillary Clinton and the Democrats lost the election, you are losing this argument," Gaetz told Democrats on the panel who charged that Republicans were trying to interfere in Mueller's probe.
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