Former FBI agents Peter Strzok (pictured) and Lisa Page again received the president's admonishing Thursday when he said they used government servers to avoid getting "caught." | Alex Wong/Getty Images white house Trump to Strzok and Page: You should have used a private server

President Donald Trump offered some advice on Thursday to former Trump-Russia FBI investigators Peter Strzok and Lisa Page: You should have used a private server.

“They didn't use their private server because they didn't want to get caught. So they used the government server,” Trump said. “That was not a good move.”


Strzok was removed from special counsel Robert Mueller’s team after it became clear he’d been romantically involved with Page and anti-Trump texts between the couple surfaced. The president and his allies have used the messages as a rallying cry for an investigation of the genesis of Mueller’s probe, which concluded in March and found there was insufficient evidence of a conspiracy between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin to interfere in the 2016 election.

Strzok also played a central role in the FBI’s investigation of Hillary Clinton’s private email server that followed her for the duration of the campaign trail in 2016.

In a 2016 message to Page, Strzok described the probe as an “insurance policy” in case Trump defeated Clinton. Strzok helped launch the counterintelligence investigation into links between the Trump campaign and the Russians.

The president and his supporters have latched onto the exchange between Strzok and Page — who Trump on Thursday called “the two lovers” — as evidence of a “deep state” scheme inside the Justice Department to undermine his presidency. Trump told reporters the act constituted “treason” and likened it to Democratic lawmakers' ongoing probe of his administration.

“They don't feel they can win the election, so they're trying to do the thousand stabs,” Trump said while taking questions from the press at a White House event for agriculture industry leaders.

Trump has vehemently fought House Democrats’ efforts to demand testimony and documents from the president and his allies. His comments Thursday come a day after he stormed out of a meeting with lawmakers, complaining he could not work with Democrats while they were investigating him.

When pressed about his use of the word “treason” Thursday, Trump said “a number of people” could be guilty of the crime, which is defined in the Constitution as “levying war” against the United States or “adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort.” Treason can be punishable by death.

“They have unsuccessfully tried to take down the wrong person,” Trump said.