2016 ELECTION/FBI/RUSSIA INVESTIGATION/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “Embattled FBI agent Peter Strzok told lawmakers Thursday in a marathon, closed-door interview that the anti-Trump text messages he exchanged with an FBI lawyer were part of an ‘intimate’ conversation and he did not intend to act on any of the missives, according to Democrats in the meeting. But Republicans argued that Strzok’s claims about the messages after the fact were simply not credible, and one lawmaker claimed to have learned new information from his interview Tuesday [6-26-18] with the House Oversight and Judiciary Committees. Strzok’s interview, which began more than seven hours ago, was just the latest instance where Republicans and Democrats came away with dueling assessments over the FBI’s actions during the 2016 election. Wednesday’s interview was the first chance for Congress to grill the FBI agent at the center of the controversy over the FBI’s handling of its investigations into Hillary Clinton and Russia. Strzok has been lambasted by Republicans — and criticized by some Democrats, too — for his anti-Trump text messages exchanged with former FBI lawyer Lisa Page. Strzok and Page, who had an extramarital affair, sent thousands of text messages while they worked on the Clinton email investigation, the Trump-Russia probe and briefly on special counsel Robert Mueller’s team. Strzok was removed from Mueller’s team after the texts were discovered; Page had already left.”
-Jeremy Herb, Manu Raju and Laura Jarrett, “Embattled FBI agent meets with Congress behind closed doors,” CNN Politics, CNN.com, June 27, 2018 5:49 pm