WASHINGTON — The Justice Department turned over to Congress additional text messages involving an FBI agent who was removed from special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigative team following the discovery of derogatory comments about President Trump.

The department said its record of messages sent to and from the agent, Peter Strzok, was incomplete because the FBI, for technical reasons, had been unable to preserve and retrieve about five months’ worth of communications.

New text messages from the spring and summer of 2016 involve discussion of the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private e-mail server. They reference then-attorney general Loretta Lynch’s decision to accept the FBI’s conclusion in that case and a draft statement that former FBI director James Comey had prepared in anticipation of closing out the Clinton investigation without criminal charges.

Strzok, a veteran agent who also worked the Clinton e-mail case, was reassigned last summer from the team investigating ties between Russia and Trump’s Republican presidential campaign.

Republicans contend the texts reveal bias against Trump.

Associated Press