Days After Stepping Down, Rosenstein Comes Out Guns Blazing Against Comey
Remember when James Comey, Robert Mueller and Rod Rosenstein were going to take down the president?
I remember liberals thinking and saying it so much I found myself almost believing it.
Alas, alas for the left. James Comey is now a self-important pundit more than a former FBI director, a man who likes tweeting photos of himself in the woods, no doubt deep in thought about how much deeper than President Donald Trump his moral gravitas goes.
Mueller has delivered his report, which found no collusion and left an open verdict on obstruction of justice, far from the “bombshell” or “dynamite” document that newsrooms all over America — from Washington to New York City, anyway — were hoping would come down.
And Rosenstein, far from being part of a merry troika that would take down the Trump presidency, kind of kicked both Mueller and Comey on the way out the door.
His kick to Mueller was a mere touch on the backside: He sided with Attorney General William Barr in recommending no obstruction of justice charges against President Trump.
As for Comey, however — well, yikes.
In remarks delivered before the Greater Baltimore Committee Monday, according to Fox News, Rosenstein called Comey a “partisan pundit,” and said the former FBI director went across “bright lines that should never be crossed.” He said Comey deserved to be been fired by Trump.
The speech came just two days after Rosenstein formally stepped aside from his role as deputy attorney general.
Rosenstein, whose last official day at Justice was Saturday, was partially railing against a commentary piece Comey wrote for The New York Times in which he said Trump “eats your soul in small bites” if you’re one of his subordinates.
Comey used the piece to ask “how could Rod Rosenstein, the deputy attorney general, after the release of Mr. Mueller’s report that detailed Mr. Trump’s determined efforts to obstruct justice, give a speech quoting the president on the importance of the rule of law? Or on resigning, thank a president who relentlessly attacked both him and the Department of Justice he led for ‘the courtesy and humor you often display in our personal conversations’?”
It’s worth noting that the president attacked Rosenstein mostly because of the fact he’d allegedly considered invoking the 25th Amendment to get Trump out of office and offered to wear a wire to get information on the president, jokingly or not.
That context may have been important here, but Comey will be Comey.
And, as far as Rosenstein is concerned, that’s not a good thing.
“Now, the former director is a partisan pundit, selling books and earning speaking fees while speculating about the strength of my character and the fate of my immortal soul,” Rosenstein said, according to Fox.
“That is disappointing. Speculating about souls is not a job for police and prosecutors. Generally, we base our opinions on eyewitness testimony.”
Rosenstein went on to attack Comey over his handling of the Hillary Clinton email scandal.
“The clearest mistake was the director’s decision to hold a press conference about an open case, reveal his recommendation and discuss details about the investigation, without the consent of the prosecutors and the attorney general,” Rosenstein said.
“Then, he chose to send a letter to the Congress on the eve of the election stating that one of the candidates was under criminal investigation, expecting it to be released immediately to the public.”
While Comey said that he felt he needed to call the infamous news conference of July 2016 exonerating Hillary Clinton after then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch had a meeting with former President Clinton on an airport tarmac in Phoenix, Rosenstein castigated Comey for the move as well as the letter just before the election when he announced the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s email had been re-opened.
“Those actions were not within the range of reasonable decisions. They were inconsistent with our goal of communicating to all FBI employees that they should respect the attorney general’s role, refrain from disclosing information about criminal investigations, avoid disparaging uncharged persons, and above all, not take unnecessary steps that could influence an election,” Rosenstein said, according to Fox.
While Rosenstein had written the memo outlining the reasons that the president would use to justify Comey’s firing, he said that the president “did not tell me what reasons to put in my memo.”
Rosenstein defended the memo as “reasonable under the circumstances,” although if he were “asked to make a recommendation before the removal decision was made” he would have made a wider-ranging list of “pros and cons” of the decision.
While he did criticize the way Trump handled Comey’s firing, he hit back at Comey’s criticisms.
“If I had been the decision maker, the removal would have been handled very differently, with far more respect and far less drama,” he said, “so I do not blame the former director for being angry.”
“My soul and character are pretty much the same today as they were two years ago. I took a few hits and made some enemies during my time in the arena, but I held my ground and made a lot of friends. And thanks to them, I think I made the right calls on the things that mattered.”
“People spend a lot of time debating whose side I was on, based on who seemed to benefit the most from any individual decision,” Rosenstein said, according to CNN. “But trying to infer partisan affiliation from law enforcement decisions is what you might call a category error. It uses the wrong frame of reference.”
That’s some pretty rough stuff. Rough enough, one assumes, that it could send Comey back to the forest for yet another contemplative shot.
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