Text Messages in Hand, Republicans Plan to Accuse Justice Department of Bias

Photo

WASHINGTON — The release Tuesday night of F.B.I. officials’ text messages describing the possibility of a victory by Donald J. Trump as “terrifying” and saying that Hillary Clinton “just has to win” is certain to fuel a Republican campaign to attack the impartiality of the Justice Department and its special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III — and possibly hamper him with an investigation of the special counsel’s office.

Accusations of bias, primed by the newly released texts from an F.B.I. agent, Peter Strzok, and an F.B.I. lawyer, Lisa Page, are likely to take center stage on Wednesday when Rod J. Rosenstein, the deputy attorney general who appointed Mr. Mueller as special counsel, testifies before the House Judiciary Committee. Republicans say they will press Mr. Rosenstein to appoint a second special counsel to investigate political partisanship in the department and to scrutinize Mr. Trump’s former presidential rival, Mrs. Clinton.

The campaign against the Justice Department, at the very least, provides a rallying cry for the president’s supporters to counter the drumbeat of news about Russian interference in the election and the possible collusion of the Trump campaign.

“Each and every day we are finding more and more instances of intractable bias that is infecting this investigation,” said Representative Matt Gaetz, a first-term Florida Republican who has emerged as one of Mr. Trump’s most vocal defenders on Capitol Hill.

Democrats on the committee will try to extract assurances from Mr. Rosenstein that Mr. Mueller’s investigation into the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia is safe.

Mr. Mueller, a registered Republican appointed by President George W. Bush to direct the F.B.I., has long had critics in the most pro-Trump corners of the House and the conservative news media. But in recent weeks, as his investigation has delivered a series of indictments to high-profile associates of the president and evidence that at least two of them are cooperating with the inquiry, those critics have grown louder and in numbers.

Moreover, the voices of doubt are no longer confined to the party’s far-right wing. They include Republican mainstays like Senators Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Charles E. Grassley of Iowa.

“I was the lone voice in the wilderness, and now I have a robust chorus behind me,” Mr. Gaetz said on Tuesday. He told Politico that he had warned Mr. Trump just days before, while in flight on Air Force One, that Mr. Mueller’s investigation was “infected with bias.”

Photo

The developments came in rapid succession on Tuesday, beginning with the president’s own legal team. Jay Sekulow, one of Mr. Trump’s outside lawyers for matters related to the Russia investigation, told Axios that mounting evidence warranted the appointment of a second special counsel to look at conflicts of interest in the Justice Department.

In an interview, Mr. Sekulow said his complaints had “nothing to do” with Mr. Mueller, with whom the president’s lawyers have continued to cooperate. Rather, he cited a Fox News report from Monday that Bruce Ohr, a senior Justice Department official, had been demoted for not disclosing meetings with officials from Fusion GPS, the investigative firm behind a controversial dossier of opposition research on the Trump campaign.

“The situation with regard to the D.O.J. and F.B.I., with regard to the Fusion GPS issue, is serious, has serious repercussions for our country and should be looked into,” Mr. Sekulow said.

Democrats say the pattern is becoming clear: As Mr. Mueller moves closer to Mr. Trump’s inner circle, Republicans try to discredit federal law enforcement and undercut the eventual findings of the special counsel. The Republican effort may also be intended to blunt the political repercussions should Mr. Mueller be fired, Democrats say.

Senator Richard Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut, who sits on the Judiciary Committee, called the demands for a second special counsel “absurd.”

“It would be unprecedented to have a special counsel look at an entire agency,” he said. “And there is no credible reason to diminish the outstanding and distinguished work done by the F.B.I. over many years simply because the president wants to deflect or distract from the ongoing special investigation of himself.”

In addition to Mr. Ohr, Republicans point to the case of Mr. Strzok, an F.B.I. agent who was removed from Mr. Mueller’s staff because of anti-Trump text messages that he traded with another person on the team. Texts exchanged between Mr. Strzok and Ms. Page came to light Tuesday night. Mr. Strzok was a key member of the F.B.I. team that investigated whether Mrs. Clinton and her aides mishandled classified information.

And they see further evidence of bias in an email sent by Andrew Weissmann, one of Mr. Mueller’s top deputies, in January telling the acting attorney general, Sally Q. Yates, that he was “so proud and in awe” of her decision not to defend Mr. Trump’s travel ban in court.

Mr. Gaetz and a half dozen or so colleagues detailed those cases on the House floor for an hour on Tuesday evening.

Representative Andy Biggs, Republican of Arizona, said the pattern about Mr. Mueller’s hiring decisions was clear: “It just happens over and over again. To get on that team you have to have a conflict or bias.”

Perhaps more portentous is the restive Senate, a less partisan body where Mr. Mueller’s appointment in May was met as a welcome relief. Skepticism about the special counsel’s investigation is starting to take root there, too.

“I think he’s got a tough job to do, but it seems he’s running far afield,” said Senator Richard C. Shelby, a long-serving Republican from Alabama. “Maybe it’s part of what he can do, but I thought he was going to investigate the Russian influence in the election, and it seems like he is going after a lot of other places, too.”

Mr. Graham, who a year ago was a leading Republican voice for a thorough investigation of Russian campaign interference, seems to have shifted his focus as well.

“I will be challenging Rs and Ds on Senate Judiciary Committee to support a Special Counsel to investigate ALL THINGS 2016 — not just Trump and Russia,” he wrote on Twitter.

Mr. Rosenstein’s hearing on Wednesday is likely to resemble that of one of his colleagues, the F.B.I. director, Christopher A. Wray, whose appearance before the Judiciary Committee last week gave Republicans ample opportunity to question the political independence of his agents.

Mr. Wray rebuffed any suggestion that his employees had a political agenda. He said that the F.B.I. made its decisions “based on nothing other than the facts and the law.”

In one exchange, Representative Louie Gohmert, Republican of Texas, rattled off a list of high-ranking F.B.I. officials and questioned whether they were politically motivated. Mr. Wray responded, “I’m not aware of any senior F.B.I. executives who are allowing improper political considerations to affect their work with me right now.”

Representative Eric Swalwell, Democrat of California, said it was “sickening” to listen to Republicans smear the F.B.I.