Lisa Page, the anti-Trump FBI lawyer who was once part of special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation, has resigned from the bureau according to a media report.
Also departing from the bureau is James Baker, another FBI lawyer who was reassigned in December 2017 amid controversy surrounding him and the Steele dossier.
Mr. Baker is said to be joining Lawfare, a national security blog affiliated with the Brookings Institution, according to The New York Times, which first reported the departures late Friday.
It is not clear if Ms. Page has another position lined up, but the Times report said she resigned “voluntarily.”
Both Mr. Baker and Ms. Page were caught up in controversies that led to accusations of political bias the bureau.
Ms. Page came under fire after text messages criticizing President Donald Trump became public. She exchanged the texts with FBI agent Peter Strzok. The pair was said to be romantically involved.
The texts referred to Mr. Trump as “an idiot” and “loathsome.”
Ms. Page advised Mr. Comey on the Hillary Clinton email investigation in 2016, when the former director announced the bureau would not pursue criminal charges against the presidential candidate. She was briefly part of the special counsel probe into Russian collusion during the 2016 election, but returned to the FBI weeks before the anti-Trump texts became public.
Former FBI Directory James Comey has said he would have removed Ms. Page from any political investigations had he been aware of her anti-Trump bias.
Mr. Baker, meanwhile, was the subject of a Justice Department investigation into allegations of leaked classified information about Christopher Steele’s Trump dossier, a document that supposedly contained evidence linking the Trump campaign to Russia, but its veracity has been disputed.
Politico reported late last year the investigation centered around contact between Mr. Baker and reporter at the left-leaning news outlet Mother Jones, which first broke the story of the dossier’s existence. Both Mr. Baker and the reporter, David Corn, have denied he was the source for the story. Just before the Politico story broke, Mr. Baker had been reassigned elsewhere in the bureau, but a reason was never provided.
On Friday night, Mr. James Comey tweeted that Mr. Baker was a “a great public servant.”
“Jim Baker’s integrity and commitment to the rule of law have benefited our country through 5 presidents, of both parties. We are fortunate he and so many others choose to devote their lives to justice,” Mr. Comey said on Twitter.
• Jeff Mordock can be reached at jmordock@washingtontimes.com.
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