In texts to a colleague, the agent overseeing the Trump investigation repeatedly expressed anti-Trump political views.<\/b>
\nWASHINGTON \u2014 New texts released Thursday by the Justice Department\u2019s inspector general show that the F. B. I. agent overseeing the investigation into President Trump\u2019s campaign pledged to stop Mr. Trump from becoming president.
\u201c[Trump\u2019s] not ever going to become president, right?\u201d asked a top F. B. I. lawyer, Lisa Page, in one text. \u201cRight?!\u201d
Peter Strzok, the agent overseeing the F. B. I.\u2019s investigation into links between Mr. Trump\u2019s campaign and Russia, answered, \u201cNo. No he won\u2019t. We\u2019ll stop it.\u201d
The exchange, in August 2016, came shortly after the investigation into Russian tampering with the election began.
The Justice Department inspector general, Michael E. Horowitz, said that the texts raise significant questions about the F. B. I.\u2019s credibility during a politically delicate investigation, but he said that he found no evidence that the agents\u2019 political views affected the inquiry.
Nevertheless, Mr. Trump\u2019s allies seized on the texts to further their contention that a \u201cDeep State\u201d embedded in the federal government had started the investigation into links between the president\u2019s campaign and Russia to take him down.
\u201cThe report shows how the F. B. I. became infected with politics and continuously disregarded rules and procedures to the detriment of Donald Trump and benefit of Hillary Clinton,\u201d said Representative Darrell Issa, Republican of California.
Along with overseeing the Trump investigation, Mr. Strzok had been the lead agent on the inquiry into Hillary Clinton\u2019s email account. The texts were included in the report by the Justice Department\u2019s inspector general into how the F. B. I. handled the investigation into Mrs. Clinton\u2019s email account during the election. The report said that many of the texts that expressed political views were related to the investigation of Mr. Trump, not of Mrs. Clinton.
\u201cThe implication in some of these text messages,\u201d Mr. Horowitz wrote, \u201cwas that Strzok might be willing to take official action to impact a presidential candidate\u2019s electoral prospects.\u201d
But, he concluded, the inspector general\u2019s office \u201cfound no evidence in emails, text messages, instant messages, or documents that suggested an improper purpose\u201d in the direction that Mr. Strzok took the investigation.
Mr. Strzok\u2019s lawyer, Aitan Goelman, said that Mr. Horowitz\u2019s conclusion about whether Mr. Strzok may have had political bias was \u201ccritically flawed\u201d and \u201cbizarre.\u201d
Mr. Goelman said that while pundits and politicians had used Mr. Strzok as a way to advance their political agenda, \u201cthe truth about Special Agent Strzok\u2019s character and professionalism is found in the fact that every witness asked by\u201d the inspector general\u2019s office \u201csaid that Strzok\u2019s work was never influenced by political views.\u201d
But those politicians kept at it. \u201cIt\u2019s a very damning indictment on Peter Strzok,\u201d said Representative Mark Meadows, Republican of North Carolina and a close ally of the president\u2019s. \u201cI don\u2019t see any way that he can continue to serve with the confidence of D. O. J. and F. B. I. officials.\u201d
Part of the report focuses on how Mr. Strzok handled the Clinton email investigation in the weeks before the election. In September 2016, senior F. B. I. officials in Washington \u2014 including Mr. Strzok \u2014 learned that the bureau had obtained a laptop from former Representative Anthony D. Weiner, the estranged husband of Huma Abedin, Mrs. Clinton\u2019s longtime aide. The officials were told there may be emails on the laptop from Mrs. Clinton\u2019s personal account.
Mr. Horowitz said the F. B. I. did not move quickly enough to look into what was on the laptop. That ensured that when Mr. Comey informed Congress that he had reopened the investigation Mrs. Clinton\u2019s email account, it came only 11 days before the election.
Mr. Horowitz said that Mr. Strzok\u2019s text about stopping Mr. Trump from becoming president showed that he may be willing to take an official action to affect the election. He said that Mr. Strzok had prioritized the Trump investigation over the Clinton one, and that had raised questions about the bureau\u2019s delay on looking into the laptop.
\u201cUnder these circumstances, we did not have confidence that Strzok\u2019s decision to prioritize the Russia investigation over following up on\u201d investigative leads related to the Clinton investigation, Mr. Horowitz said.
Mr. Goelman strongly disagreed.
\u201cIn fact, all facts contained in the report led to the conclusion that the delay was caused by a variety of factors and miscommunications that had nothing to do with Special Agent Strzok\u2019s political views,\u201d he said. \u201cThe report itself provides indisputable evidence that, when informed that Weiner\u2019s laptop contained Clinton emails, Strzok immediately had the matter pursued by two of his most qualified and aggressive investigators.\u201d
The texts released Thursday were recently discovered by the inspector general\u2019s office. It had been revealed in December that Mr. Strzok and Ms. Page had exchanged anti-Trump texts. Shortly after that disclosure, the Department of Justice provided hundreds of them to Congress, which made them public.
The texts set off a stream of criticism against the F. B. I. from Mr. Trump, his allies and conservative news media outlets. Since then, the Trump camp has demonized Mr. Strzok and Ms. Page, saying that the texts are evidence that the investigation is truly a \u201cwitch hunt.\u201d
Mr. Horowitz said that \u201cthe damage caused by these employees\u2019 actions extends far beyond the scope\u201d of the Clinton investigation and goes \u201cto the heart of the F. B. I.\u2019s reputation for neutral fact finding and political independence.\u201d<\/p>\n

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