President Donald Trump demanded to know where the 50,000 text messages exchanged between two Federal Bureau of Investigation staffers accused of expressing views against him had gone.
Trump tweeted Tuesday night: 'Where are the 50,000 important text messages between FBI lovers Lisa Page and Peter Strzok? Blaming Samsung!'
However Trump's tweet could have been read that he was being sarcastic over the FBI losing the texts which have been blamed on an upgrade problem.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions had earlier ordered an investigation, the Justice Department said.
Texts between FBI agent Peter Strzok and FBI lawyer Lisa Page exchanged between December 14, 2016, and May 17, 2017, are among a broader batch of missing phone messages that the FBI's system failed to store because of a software upgrade glitch on many Samsung 5 cellphones.