Recovered FBI agent texts include reaction to James Comey's firing
CBS News has obtained recovered texts of former FBI agents Peter Strzok and Lisa Page that were being sent to Capitol Hill Thursday. These texts include the reaction of the two to the firing of FBI Director James Comey on May 9, 2017.
A few days after he was fired, on May 13, Strzok wrote to Page, "Having a tough time processing tonight, Lis. Feeling a profound sense of loss."
Page responded, "I feel that same loss. I want to see what the FBI could become under him! His vision of greatness for our strong but flawed organization. I'm angry. Angry and mourning."
Strzok and Page, who both worked on the Hillary Clinton email server investigation and subsequently on the FBI's investigation into Russian election meddling in the 2016 election, became known for their anti-Trump text message exchanges. In January, the Department of Justice delivered 9,000 of those texts to Congress. But the FBI in January said it was also missing texts for about a five-month period from Dec. 14, 2016, to May 17, 2017, the day Robert Mueller was appointed special counsel. The DOJ watchdog in January said it recovered those those texts, after blaming many FBI-provided Samsung 5 phones for a failure to capture texts.
Strzok was removed from Mueller's team after he and Page, who had already left Mueller's team, were suspected of exchanging those anti-Trump text messages.
As CBS News' Andres Triay previously reported, Strzok was involved in the letter sent from then-FBI Director James Comey to members of Congress on Oct. 28, 2016, after additional Clinton emails were discovered on the laptop belonging to Anthony Weiner. Weiner is a former congressman and the husband of top Clinton aide Huma Abedin.
The Strzok-Page text saga has become particularly important to Republicans, as some criticize the operations of the Justice Department. Mr. Trump had potentially ominous words for his own DOJ on Thursday morning in an interview with "Fox and Friends."
"You look at the corruption at the top of the FBI — it's a disgrace," Mr. Trump said. "And our Justice Department, which I try and stay away from, but at some point I won't."
CBS News' Rebecca Kaplan contributed to this report.
