Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ decision to recuse himself from investigations into the man he campaigned for but not to appoint a special prosecutor means that the person probing into Donald Trump’s Russia ties will work for Sessions. That’s unacceptable—but with congressional Republicans unwilling to press Trump on anything meaningful, it’s the reality for now. So who will be the Trump/Sessions employee taking on this job?
Rod J. Rosenstein is in the process of going from being the longest-serving U.S. attorney to being deputy attorney general:
President Clinton’s deputy attorney general hired Rosenstein to be his counsel. During the Clinton administration, Kenneth W. Starr tapped him to be his associate independent counsel on the investigation into the business dealings of the Clintons and their associates in the Whitewater Development Corp.
Rosenstein stayed on into the George W. Bush administration and in 2005, Bush appointed him U.S. attorney for the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, where he remained through the Obama administration.
During the Obama administration, Attorney General Eric Holder chose Rosenstein to investigate leaks of classified information, an investigation that led to a guilty plea from the former vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. James Cartwright.
Rosenstein sounds like an accomplished prosecutor who has some professional pride, which is kind of a best-case scenario for the Trump Justice Department … but he still shouldn’t be in charge of investigations into his boss.