Lisa Page sues FBI and State Department for leaks that led to Trump attacking her

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Former FBI lawyer Lisa Page is suing her former employer and the US Justice Department, claiming the government violated the US Privacy Act by leaking her messages to the press.

The lawsuit follows just a day after the release of a Justice Department inspector general report, which found that investigation into Donald Trump's 2016 campaign was not started out of political animus towards the then-candidate — as he has claimed, using Ms Page's text messages to former FBI agent Peter Strzok trashing him as evidence of the conspiracy.

"I sued the Department of Justice and FBI today," Ms Page wrote on Twitter.

She continued: "I take little joy in having done so. But what they did in leaking my messages to the press was not only wrong, it was illegal."

Ms Page is suing the US using the Privacy Act of 1974, which governs how the government can collect, maintain, use, and disseminate personally identifiable information in federal systems. In court documents, Ms Page notes that the law is particularly relevant to federal employees, since they often submit a vast array of information in order to receive approval for employment.

Her case has become one of the most recognisable in the ongoing drama between Mr Trump and American intelligence services, after texts between her and Mr Strzok were made public detailing their views towards president.

The leaked texts show that, during the 2016 election, the pair — who were then said to be having an affair — Ms Page and Mr Strzok expressed fear to one another about a potential Trump presidency.

"[Trump's] not ever going to become president? Right?!" Ms Page wrote to him. She also reportedly wrote: "This man cannot be president," according to the New York Times.

Those are among some 375 text messages included in a 90 page document released by the US government to reporters in December 2017, according to Ms Page's new lawsuit, which argues that the officials who authorised that release "sought to use, and ultimately did use, the messages to promote the false narrative that [Ms Page] and others at the FBI were biased against President Trump, had conspired to undermine him, and otherwise had engaged in allegedly criminal acts, including treason."

The new inspector general report undermines that notion that Ms Page and Mr Strzok had acted in such a biased way in their official capacity.