IMPEACHMENT MONDAY?: The Case Against Rod Rosenstein
Richard Moorhead
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Members of the House Freedom Caucus, led by its Chairman Mark Meadows, are preparing a new effort to impeach deep-state linked Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, according to Politico on Friday. Rosenstein has become the target of criticism and suspicion from House conservatives for his refusal to cooperate with congressional investigations into FBI corruption, and failing to respond to a congressional subpoena requesting Department of Justice documents related to the matter. Deputy AG Rosenstein currently exercises DOJ oversight over Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of potential Russian-linked proliferation of memes and online content during the 2016 Presidential Election, due to the recusal of Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
It’s possible that members of Congress could file the impeachment documents by Monday, bringing to a climax escalating tensions between House Republicans and Rosenstein. Rosenstein had earlier been accused of threatening to launch investigations into congressional staff as a means of retaliation against House Republicans issuing subpoenas and exercising congressional oversight over his activities. Fox News had reported that staff on the House Intelligence Committee felt “personally attacked” during a meeting with Rosenstein in January.
The Chairman of the House Judiciary Comittee, Bob Goodlatte, had blamed Rosenstein for the spectacle on display during Thursday’s congressional testimony from disgraced FBI agent and sleaze Peter Strzok. Despite being dismissed from Robert Mueller’s investigation for political bias displayed in text messages sent to his adulterous lover- in which he suggested the FBI would unilaterally prevent Donald Trump’s victory in the 2016 Presidential Election- Strzok had refused to answer any of the Committee’s questions that inquired into Russia-related FBI investigations. Strzok maintained that the FBI had forbidden him from answering such questions, a directive that Rosenstein could ultimately rescind in the interests of public transparency and congressional oversight of the troubled agency.
Potential impeachment proceedings of Rosenstein would require a simple-majority vote in the House and a two-thirds majority in the U.S Senate for conviction.
Patrick Howley reported for Big League Politics:
WASHINGTON — Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein gave a resume to the Senate Judiciary Committee for his confirmation to be Deputy Attorney General. In that resume, provided under oath, he falsely stated the dates at which he worked for Ken Starr’s investigative legal team.
Rosenstein testified to the Senate that he worked on Starr’s team beginning in 1995 and ending in 1997. Rosenstein said that he began working at the U.S. Attorney’s office in Maryland for the Clinton administration in the year 1997. However, records show that Rosenstein interviewed Hillary Clinton for Ken Starr in the Whitewater case on January 14, 1998.
Rosenstein’s official interview with Hillary Clinton lasted fifteen minutes and cleared her of charges stemming from the seizing of FBI documents on the former Clinton White House travel director.
Big problem: That official interview took place outside of the time period in which Rosenstein told the Senate he worked for Kenneth Starr’s team.
An Associated Press wire report on January 14, 1998 lists Rod Rosenstein as one of two “Whitewater prosecutors” present at Hillary Clinton’s interview on the FBI Travel Office scandal. Rosenstein was in charge of the “FBI Travel Office case,” in which it was alleged that the Bill Clinton White House seized FBI file documents on “former White House employees.” Rosenstein swept the matter under the rug, according to insiders, and then obscured any record of it on his Senate questionnaire to be Deputy Attorney General.
Here’s Rosenstein’s official resume that he gave to the Senate for his confirmation. Notice how he lists his term in Ken Starr’s office as lasting from 1995 to 1997, and how he began his new job in the Clinton administration U.S. Attorney’s office in Maryland in 1997:
Big League Politics has learned that Attorney General Jeff Sessions personally wanted Rosenstein to be his No. 2 at the Department of Justice, and that White House counsel Don McGahn smoothed the matter over with President Donald Trump. Sessions has a relationship with Rosenstein through a well-connected Washington lawyer named Charles Cooper, who is a University of Alabama alum and who represents Sessions in the Russia case. Cooper interviewed Rosenstein when Sessions was considering making Rosenstein his number two, and Cooper signed off on Rosenstein. Cooper saw confidential Iran-Contra documents alongside other Reagan administration officials in a 1986 meeting at Old Ebbit Grill, a restaurant in the nation’s capital.
Rosenstein is also a close personal friend of FBI director Christopher Wray…
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