Live: Rod Rosenstein Testifies Before Senate On Russia Investigation | NBC News

good morning everybody for those watching on television is 28 degrees I don't know what it is but let it be said the air conditioning and the Senate works thank you all we're gonna have a hearing today about about all things crossfire hurricane and the Muller investigation we'll have five minute rounds and as usual I'll try to make sure you not cut off at five minutes and finish your thought and appreciate all the participation mr. Rosen Stein thank you very much for coming to the committee voluntarily and we appreciate your service to our country and your participation in the hearing today and I'll try to do a pretty short opening statement senator Feinstein then we'll get right to the witness so why are we here I think we have a clip that I'd like to play now this is a mr. Rosen Stein may 1st 2018 illustrate though wait a minute turn it up stop the distinction between the way we operate the department and we make mistakes that's not to say we're flawless but when we operate in the Department of Justice if we can accuse somebody in wrongdoing we'd have to have admissible evidence in credible witnesses made there to prove our case in court and we have to fix our signature - in charging that that's something that not everybody appreciates there's a lot of talk about FISA applications and many people that I see talking about it seem not to recognize what a fine SAP laquetta v SAP location is actually a warrant just like a search warrant in order to get a FISA search warrant you need an affidavit signed by a career federal law enforcement officer who swears that the information in the affidavit is true and correct to the best of his knowledge and the roof and that's the way we operate and if it's wrong sometimes it is if you find out there's anything incorrect in there that person is going to face consequences sometimes there are innocent errands but if not you can face discipline or petition human prosecution so well thank you that was delivered at the Freedom Forum by mr. Rosen Stein May of 2018 and you described the way the system is supposed to work and what brings us here is the fact it didn't work that way we know now based on the Horowitz report that was delivered to this committee in December 2019 that the FISA warrant application process did not work the way mr. Rosen Stein described it in 2018 what do we know we know that his skull fitori information was withheld from the court we know according to mr. Horowitz without the steel dossier paid for by the Democratic Party prepared by a former British agent working with a Russian sub source without that dossier there would have been no warrant issued against Carter page we also now know that email was doctored to get the FISA warrant by a lawyer at the FBI so why are we here we're trying to find out how that happened we're trying to find out how crossfire hurricane got so off script and we're design our desire is to make sure it never happens again every American should be concerned by the fact that the Inspector General found criminal wrongdoing abuse of power and a warrant application against Carter page a advisor to the Trump campaign and we're here to try to find out who knew what when find out did mr. Rosen Stein did you know that the sub source disavowed the dossier in January 2017 to the FBI says a bunch of bar talk and hearsay did you know that the FBI lawyer doctored an email showing a relationship between mr. Page and the CIA he changed that where there was no relationship did you know that and if you did know it why and we're gonna ask everybody who signed the warrant did you know and if you didn't know why and now that you know dunno how do you feel about it and I want the the country to understand that the Muller investigation was allowed to go forward with bipartisan support I remember senator Coons and Booker coming to me and Senator Grassley and Senator Tillis saying let's make sure that Muller can do his job without interference the president was pretty hot when it came to the Mulder investigation and we came up with legislation to protect the general counsel from being dismissed without cost but let the country know let the president know it was important from Muller to do his job now it's important to find out what the hell happened how could have gotten to be where where it wound up being what evidence if any was there in May of 2017 when Muller was appointed by mr. Rosen Stein that anybody on the Trump campaign was colluding with the Russians was there a lawful predicate to appoint Muller to begin with and we'll be looking at that and we'll be looking at how the warrant was signed over and over by the highest-ranking officials in this country and given to a FISA Court on four different occasions over a period of months and it was full of lies and criminally altered I hope you want to know that I sure do and you got to remember the people running the Muller investigation are the same people that were running crossfire hurricane at least until they got fired so the warrant application that mr. Rosen Stein signed in June of 2017 the last application against Carter page who prepared the application remember struck and page March 3rd 2016 God Trump is a loathsome loathsome human being struck oh my god he's an idiot struck God Hillary should win a hundred million to nothing these are the people in charge of the Muller investigation the FBI lawyer who altered the email after the election said viva la resistance this is the FBI lawyer in charge of overseeing the Muller investigation and finally on August 8 2016 page says destruct he's not ever going to be come president right struck no no he won't we'll stop it this is why we're here we're going to get to the bottom all this and we did a lot together when it came to Russian interference in her election we had hearings the modus operandi the toolbox of Russia and other autocracies for undermining democracy throughout the world Russian interference in the 2016 election may 2017 extremist content and Russian disinformation online October 2017 protecting our elections examining shell companies and virtual currencies as avenues for foreign interference June 2018 cyber threats are non-national against our national critical infrastructure August 2018 we have looked at Russia's role in the election now we're going to look at the Muller investigation and we're going to look hard and we're going to see if what mr. Rosenstein said at the start of this hearing comes true that if somebody corrupts the process that if somebody lies to the court they face discipline or maybe criminal prosecution you describe mr. Rosen Stein the way it should work and you gave us an indication of what happens if it doesn't work that way well what will happen there are millions of Americans pretty upset about this they're people on our side of the aisle who believe that this investigation crossfire hurricane was one of the most corrupt bias criminal investigations in the history of the FBI and we would like to see something done about it mr. Durham is looking at the criminality part what is our job our job is explained to the American people what the Russians were up to and we did that together our job was to give mr. Muller the chance to do his work and he did now it's our job to take the Horowitz report that showed 17 violations of the FISA warrant applications against Carter page and tried to explain how that happened and shed light on the fact that it did happen and hope the system will respond what are we going to be looking at we're going to be looking at general Flynn's case we're going to be looking at the fact on January the 4th 2017 the filled office in Washington DC said that there's no longer justification for general Flynn to be considered part of crossfire hurricane we're going to be looking at the Muller appointment in May of 2017 to see if there was a crime worthy of being investigated was there any there there we're going to look backward so that we can move forward we're going to hold people accountable if you don't like Trump fine but this is not about liking Trump or not liking Trump this is about us as a nation we're talking about the nominee for president on the Republican side and his campaign being under continual investigation we're talking about warrants being issued after the president was sworn in we're talking about a two-year investigation that spent 25 to 30 million dollars turned people's lives upside down to see if it should have ever happened to begin with we're going to be talking about how it got off the rails who's responsible for getting off the rails and making sure that they're punished appropriately and the system is changed so in the future no other candidate for president no other sitting president has to go through this that's why we're here it's going to take a while but we will not be deterred in our effort to get to the bottom of what I think was a very major abuse of power senator Feinstein thank you very much mr. chairman as we as you have made abundantly clear we are here at your request to examine crossfire hurricane that's the FBI investigation into Russian election interference and ties to the Trump campaign let me begin with a bit of history the president has long claimed that the investigation of his campaign was a witch-hunt and a hoax and has demanded that his allies quote investigate the investigators and quote and other Obama era officials including Joe Biden as support for this claim the president and his allies point to errors identified by DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz and FISA surveillance on former Trump campaign aide Carter page inspector general Horowitz did in fact identify serious errors in the handling of the Carter page FISA application a broader pfizer FISA audit revealed that many of these problems are unfortunately widespread this needs to be fixed and efforts to do so are already underway in the FBI Congress and the FISA Court itself but contrary to the president's claims that his campaign was unfairly targeted inspector general Horowitz found no evidence a political or anti-trump bias in the crossfire hurricane investigation I've watched this IG carefully now since 2012 that's eight years and find him and in to be independent and believable and inspector general Horowitz also confirmed that the opening of the investigation into possible ties between the Trump campaign and Russia was in fact justified as Horowitz's report explains Australian officials informed the FBI in late July 2016 the Trump campaign adviser George papadopolis was told in April that Russia was willing to quote assist the campaign meaning assist the Trump campaign by anonymously releasing dirt on Clinton in the form of quote thousands of emails and quote the FBI learned this one week after WikiLeaks had released 20,000 emails that Russia had hacked from the computers of the Democratic National Committee the hacks by Russia and the possibility that the Trump campaign knew of Russia's plans to use the stolen emails to interfere in the 2016 election created a counterintelligence concern that the FBI was obligated to investigate I think everybody recognized that that counterintelligence investigation eventually became the Muller investigation when in May 2017 Deputy Attorney General rod Rosenstein appointed Bob mill Muller as special counsel after the president fired FBI director James Comey Muller's investigation revealed quote sweeping and systematic end quote interference by Russia in the 2016 election that should cause every one that's American some deep concern significantly the Special Counsel investigation determined that the Russian government quote perceived it would benefit from a trump presidency and work to secure the outcome end quote that's from the Muller report volume 1 page 1 the investigation uncovered more than 120 contacts between the Trump campaign and individuals linked to Russia revealing that the Trump campaign knew about welcomed and quote expected it would benefit electorally end quote from Russia's interference and the investigation established that individuals associated with the Trump campaign lied to Congress the special counsel and the American people about their contacts with Russia IG Horowitz confirmed that none of the FISA errors his investigation uncovered call into question quote any part of the special counsels report and quote and today's witness mr. Rosenstein has said that the Special Counsel investigation was quote justified end quote and quote and inspect an important investigation and quote unfortunately the president and his allies have been trying to rewrite the special counsels findings since the day they were released but ignoring or excusing what happened in 2016 is really very dangerous it puts American democracy and national security at risk be i director ray has confirmed that Russia continues to interfere and that its attempt to influence the 2020 election quote a significant counterintelligence threat end quote special counsel Muller also wormed that Russian interference was happening quote as we sit here end quote yet instead of denouncing foreign interference President Trump has encouraged and even demanded it in a televised interview following the Muller report president Trump said there was quote nothing wrong end quote with foreign governments offering political dirt on an opponent and that he would quote take it end quote likely without informing the FBI the president publicly called on China to investigate Joe Biden his rival in the twenty20 election that's in 10 3:19 remarks of the president and the president abused presidential authority by withholding critical United States military aid and an oval office meeting in an effort to pressure Ukraine's president into announcing an investigation of Joe Biden unfortunately it appears that Senate Republicans now plan to spend the next several months bolstering the president's attack on the Russia investigation and his Democratic nominee Democrat Democrat Joe Biden Congress should not conduct politically motivated investigations designed to attack or help any presidential candidate mr. chairman period this would be true at any time but even more so now as our nation confronts the brutal police killing of George Floyd and it's aftermath and remains in the middle a public health and economic crisis thank you thank you very much senator Feinstein mr. Stein would you please rise Stan you solemnly swear the testimony you about to give this committee is the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth so if you got thank you you may make your statement Thank You chairman Graham ranking member Feinstein and other members of the committee thank you for inviting me to join you today when I was sworn in as Deputy Attorney General on April 26 2017 I became responsible for helping the Attorney General to supervise 115,000 Department of Justice employees and to oversee hundreds of thousands of cases one of the most important matters pending in the department was an investigation of Russian election influence schemes attorney general sessions had complied with his legal obligation to recuse himself from that investigation seven weeks before I arrived and the matter had been under the supervision of Acting Deputy Attorney General Dana Bente as a result many federal agents and prosecutors were working on criminal cases that officials considered potentially relevant to Russian election meddling as a result of events that follow the departure of the FBI director I was concerned that the public would not have confidence in the investigation and that the acting FBI director was not the right person to lead it I decided that appointing a special counsel was the best way to complete the investigation appropriately and to promote public confidence in its conclusions as we now know the eventual conclusions were that Russians committed crimes seeking to influence the election and Americans did not conspire with them a special counsel appointment was consistent with Department of Justice President Attorney General Bill Barr and Attorney General Janet Reno each in the 1990s had appointed special counsels in several cases when they concluded that prosecutor with some degree of independence from the department could best resolve sensitive matters a recently Attorney General Bar has assigned US attorneys to take charge of significant investigations but in May of 2017 there were only 3 confirmed United States attorneys remaining all Obama administration appointees who had been ordered to resign and had been permitted to hold over for just a few months some people confuse special counsels and independent counsels independent counsels are appointed by federal judges the Department of Justice does not supervise them they often expand their jurisdiction and they usually investigate for many years in contrast Special Counsel Muller was supervised by the department with jurisdiction that was limited both in scope and in duration I asked the special counsel to review each criminal allegation the FBI considered relevant to Russian election influenced operations and recommend whether to close the matter to investigate because it might be relevant to Russian election meddling or to refer the matter to another prosecutor I also established a supervisory chain of command within the Department highly-qualified Department attorneys met regularly with the Special Counsel team to review recommendations about which matters to investigate and to approve significant steps in consultation with me whenever the special counsel proposed charges for which a United States Attorney would need approval from the Department of Justice from a headquarters division those charges were reviewed as usual by the tax division the National Security Division or the criminal division I understand that today's hearing may focus on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act when I serve as Deputy Attorney General every FBI FISA application was written by agents and attorneys reviewed by supervisors sworn under oath by a federal agent and certified by the FBI director before any application was submitted to the court a senior department official either the Attorney General the Deputy Attorney General or the assistant attorney general for national security met with National Security Division supervisors to ensure that the application set forth a valid legal and factual basis ultimately each application was submitted to a federal judge who decided whether it set forth probable cause that justified the issuance of a warrant every application that I approved appeared to be justified based on the facts that alleged and the FBI was supposed to be following protocols to ensure that every fact was verified but investigative reviews published by the Inspector General in December 2019 in March of 2020 those investigative reviews revealed that the FBI was not following the protocols and that significant errors appeared in applications filed in connection with the crossfire hurricane investigation the Inspector General concluded and I quote that so many basic and fundamental errors were made by three separate hand-picked teams on one of the FBI's most sensitive investigations that FBI officials expected would be subject to close scrutiny raise significant questions regarding the FBI chain of commands management and supervision of the FISA process of senators whenever agents or prosecutors make serious mistakes or engage in this conduct the Department of Justice needs to take remedial action and of existing policies fall short those policies need to be changed ensuring the integrity of governmental processes is essential to promoting public confidence in the rule of law while it is necessary to correct mistakes and to punish wrongdoers it certainly should not go unsaid today that our law enforcement agencies are filled with men and women who act with integrity as we watch them deal with extraordinarily difficult dances throughout the country this week we should take this opportunity to let them know that they have our appreciation and our support in conclusion I know that the members of this committee share a commitment to the principles of the Department of Justice I look forward to addressing your questions thank you and thank you mr. Rosen Stein and I want to echo what you said most FBI agents most law enforcement officers to risk our lives into a job to protect our country and we appreciate them but every now and then things get off-script and that's what brings us here today you signed a warrant application in June of I think 2017 to get the Carter page warrant renewed is that correct yes okay have you looked at the horas report yes I have a habit with me senator if you knew then what you know now would you have signed the warrant application no I would not and the reason you wouldn't have is because mr. Hartz found that it's gulp Tauri information was withheld from the court is that correct among other reasons and somebody actually altered an email correct right so there were 17 violations that mr. Horwitz found but I can't stress enough to the country that he found the most egregious of all the dossier was the only reason the Carter page warrant was issued to begin with and in January 2017 the man who provided steal all the information told the FBI was a bunch of garbage and they used it twice more what kind of country is this what happens to people who do that did you know that you didn't know that did you know sir do you think mccabe knew that I hope not senator I do not personally know was he in charge of the investigation yes he was did he ever lie to you mr. McCabe I don't believe senator that there were any occasions when which identify that he lied to me okay did he ever say anything looking back that is perplexing the well that's a very broad question senator I had a lot of time do you think he was truthful to you well I believed senator that mr. McCabe was not fully candid with me certainly wasn't forthcoming you know in particular senator the with regard to mr. commis memoranda of his interviews with the president and with regard to the FBI's suspicions about the president Mr McCabe did not reveal those to me for at least a week after he became Acting Director despite the fact that we have repeated conversations focusing on this investigation and for whatever reasons mr. McCabe was not forthcoming with me about that he has subsequently said publicly in in public comments he's made about the investigation that his team had been leading up to certain important decisions for some time from my perspective senator they'd been in conducting this investigation for I believe approximately nine much did you rely on mr. capes statements to sign the warrant how much did that factor into whether or not she thought the warrant application was accurate regard to the warrant application senator I wouldn't say that I relied on mr. McCabe's statements I certainly had the understanding of what mr. cave Mr McKay had told me but the the document stands for itself it's a hundred pages right and I relied on what I understood to be in the application you did a scope letter I think August 2017 after your appointed Muller you know what I'm talking about yes sir memorandum I suppose who prepared that well senator the I don't know exactly who prepared it I know how it came about if you'd like me to explain yeah please very quickly the not sure how quickly I can do it but I'd ask mr. moehner to look at the whole to look at all the relevant relevant matters where did the information in the document come from did come from the Muller team I believe it came from the Muller team but it came to me through the team that I had set up to interface with the Muller team okay the team that you sent that interface with the Muller team did they make the conclusions that you need to be looking at Papadopoulos and all these people for colluding with Russia I think important senator recognized one of the reasons I was very reluctant to release these documents publicly is because we investigate people who are not necessarily guilty and so I didn't have any presumption that these folks were guilty of anything did you believe a nation did you bleed they committed a crime I believe that there was I understood that there was predication to investigate it I didn't believe where did that come from who gave you that predication well they came from information that came to me from the FBI initially was it from struck and page are those two the people preparing all these documents I don't know who was prepared they in charge were they still the investigators for Muller early on my understanding senator is that miss Paige and mr. struck were working with okay well what input if any did they have into the information contained in the memo I don't know the answer to that okay who provided the information the memo I'm sorry which memo are we talking to one for you lay out the scope of the investigation that came through discussions between mr. Muller's team and what did anybody on your team recommend you look at Papadopoulos where did the where did the idea that George papadopolis working with the Russians came from these matters senator will I believe were already open well yeah the point is that they were open these are the same people doing cross for fire hurricane and they gave you a document to sign and here's my belief that they prepared the document that they defined the scope of their own investigation is that fair to say that you're just a conduit for it well I'm relying on information that's coming out yeah well you didn't do an independent investigation yourself did you my job isn't to do the investigation now did you do you didn't do an INT you basically relied on what they gave you is that fair to say relied on the information that yeah just like you did with a warrant correct okay so the same people that gave you the warrant application also gave you them the scope investigation for Muller so that's why we're here to find out how much we can trust these people now to appoint a special counsel there's got to be evidence criminal investigation of a person or matter is warranted what was the crime that you were looking at so I think senator it's important to understand first of all that's what's required under the regulation right it's actually not required to appoint a special counsel again well what was was there a crime being looked at or not a particular case yes what was the crime original crime underlying crime was the Russian influence operation okay can you tell us what evidence existed that general flam was colluding with the Russians in May of 2017 I don't the evidence against general Flynn first of all senator what evidence existed that general flam was colluding with the Russians in 2017 May of 27 I can't comment about that case senator beyond what did you know then in January the 4th 2017 the FBI field office said we recommend that general Flynn be removed from crossfire hurricane no I do not ok would that have mattered if you had known that yes ok did you know that they had recordings of mr. Papadopoulos somewhere overseas saying no I never worked with the Russians worst of the effect that if the campaign did that would be treason did you know that exists in order not okay did you know that Carter page how many times did Carter page meet with Donald Trump I don't know the answer that's okay how many times did Papadopoulos meet with Donald Trump I don't know that well I can tell you zero in any meaningful way the dossier claims that man report was that Carter page was a Condit manop or passing along Russian information do you are you aware of the fact that Carter page has said numerous times I never talked to Manta port yes I am okay so the point is when you made this appointment the people named in it there's zero evidence they were working with the Russians zero and this went on for two years twenty-five million dollars in people had their lives turned upside down that general Flynn in January the four 2017 the FBI agents who have been looking him they recommended he be dropped in our good old buddy struck said no the seventh floor wants to look at him if you had known that would you'd ask more questions yes okay anyway thank you for your service knowing what you know now do you have any reservations about of making the Muller appointment given the fact that all the people named in this scope letter there's like zero evidence by January May 2017 they were working with the Russians do you have any concerns at all I think senator there are two issues the first is whether the investigation was appropriate and the second is whether it was appropriate to assign it to mr. Muller and the decision that I made obviously was based on the information I had at the time you need to make I'm not arguing with you about assigning it to Muller I'm saying was there a legitimate reason to believe that any of the people named in this letter were actively working with the Russians in August 2017 in August 2017 that's when you signed a memo my understanding senator was that there there was what what was it based now again senator the investigation is concluded and these people were not conspiring with the Russians the information available at the time including why do we have the Muller investigation or all if we had concluded they weren't working with the Russians I don't believe we had concluded it at that time I'm saying in January the 4th 2017 the FBI had discounted Flynn there was no evidence that Carter Paige worked with the Russians the dossier was a bunch of garbage and Papadopoulos is all over the place not knowing he's being recorded denying working with the Russians nobody has ever been prosecuted for working with the Russians the point is the whole concept that the campaign was cluding with the Russians there was no there there in August 2017 do you agree with that general statement or not I agree with that general statement thank you thank you and welcome I'd like to begin with the impact of the steel dossier if I might inspector general Horowitz confirmed that the crossfire hurricane investigation excuse me was open because the FBI was told the Trump campaign advisor George papadopolis had advanced knowledge that Russia was planning to release stolen emails from to harm Clinton and helped Trump the FBI officials who made that decision had not even seen the steel dossier but because the steel dossier was cited in the Carter page FISA applications the president and his allies falsely claimed that the entire Russia investigation was started because the steel dossier would never have happened if it hadn't been for Steel's reporting you appointed special counsel Muller is that true yes you supervised Muller's investigation please can you identify for us any findings in Muller's 448 page report that rely on information from the steel dossier I don't believe there is any such information thank you can you identify which of the hundred and 99 criminal counts resulting from the Muller investigation rely on information from the steel dossier I don't believe that the steel dossier was relied upon for the indictments thank you can you identify investigative steps taken by Muller that relied on invest information in the steel dossier I wouldn't know the answer to that senator with regard to individual steps thank you did Special Counsel Muller ever expressed concern that FBI or DOJ officials had unfairly targeted the president or his campaign for investigation I never had that discussion with mr. Muller did he ever indicate that there was not a legitimate reason to investigate ties between the Trump campaign and Russia he never indicated senator that there was not a legitimate reason to complete the investigation did you ever have any concerns that Muller's investigation was illegitimate biased unfairly targeted the president or his campaign I talked with mr. Muller about ensuring that there was no bias in the investigation as you know we did have an issue with one of the agents and another FBI employee who were working on the case and I talked with mr. Muller at that time and subsequently about the importance of making sure that everybody on in his investigation understood whatever their political views that they needed to set that aside and make sure that the investigation was not affected by any bias and do you believe that was carried out I do because I have confidence in mr. Miller's integrity do you believe the Muller investigation was a hoax or a witch hunt or a deep state conspiracy I do not believe the investigation was a hoax senator but with regard to the nature of the allegations keep in mind those allegations are coming from other sources and I can't vouch for the allegations you signed off on all significant steps in the Muller investigation was that because you believe them to be legitimate and supported by the evidence everything that I approve senator yes and nothing came to my attention that I thought was illegitimate thank you very much Thank You mr. chairman thank you senator Grassley yeah thanks to a general bar Preity material relating to Flynn has been released so too has a fling transcript with the Russian ambassador those materials include records that show one the FBI planned to close the Flynn case until struck interceded to that FBI notes that show the FBI may have deliberately set Flynn up to prosecute him or get him fired three the FBI had no derogatory information on Flynn and four there was no legitimate factual predicate to interview him mr. Rosenstein you and Muller withheld these records from Congress and Flynn's legal team in June of 2018 I met with you to discuss the Flynn case and my other oversight request you suggested to me that Congress should be satisfied with the facts contained in the plea agreement in light of all the Brady material that has finally been released it's clear you were misleading me Congress and the American people when you suggested that we should be satisfied with Flynn's plea agreement question the whole point of the Muller investigation was to uncover interference in the 2016 election yet Muller ignored the fact that intelligence reports from before he was appointed said the steal dossier contained rationed disinformation remember that's the same dossier that was paid for by the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign did you instruct Muller to investigate the originals the origin of the dossier and if not why not Thank You senator first of all I certainly did not intend to mislead you or anybody else and if I could just address that briefly because I do recall that conversation senator and my view was that the case was pending in court and there's a long-standing principle of the department that when a case is pending in court we let the judicial process work through and we engage with Congress about pending cases and that's the only reason why I was reluctant to disclose information not that I was concealing anything I obviously didn't know that there was exculpatory evidence and with regard to the evidence that's in the record now because it was followed by the department I'm not gonna express any opinion about that I'm gonna wait and hear what general Barr has to say about it but much of that senator was news to me with regard to the other question you asked senator keep in mind that my goal with regard to the special counsel was to keep that investigation focused and get it resolved as expeditiously as possible I knew that an investigation of the steel dossier and the origins of the Russian investigation would be far more complicated and take far more time and I did I didn't believe and I don't believe in general Barre believes we need an independent special counsel from outside the department to do that Germa bar is trusting us attorney Durham to do that and I think that's a reasonable decision so no I did not ask director Miller to do that and and I'm actually grateful that we wrapped up the Special Counsel phase in 22 months and if there's other information to be uncovered I'm confident it will be uncovered when you approved the fourth and final FISA against Carter page were you aware that intelligence reports weren't that warned that the steel dossier was a product of Russian disinformation were you also aware that the Steel's report were not fully verified and that some steel sources supported Clinton if so why did you approve the Pfizer no I did not and if I could explain senator and other time is limited but the steel dossier is not in the FISA it was not submitted to the court there's information from steel that's in the application but my understanding and again I've reviewed a lot of FISA applications during my tenure my understanding is that what's in that affidavits is verified and so the steel dossier and all the nonsense that was in the media about these allegations that have been made that that's not in the fisa application what's in the Phi's application my understanding was was verified information and of course there is other information it's not just information that came from mr. steel let me let me please get to one final point my times just about out on may this 9th 2017 you wrote a memo to Attorney General recommending Comey termination I that same day the president terminated you on May the 12th you sent an email to Muller that said quote the boss and his staff do not know about our discussions end quote on May the 16th the day before you appointed Muller you emailed a former Deputy Attorney General and said quote I am with Muller he shares my views duty calls sometimes the moment chooses us and to quote what when you reference the boss who are you referring to and did you discuss appointing Muller with any Obama administration of officials if so who thank you very much senator for asking that question as a criminal investigator what we found emails were very useful evidence but sometimes they could be misleading because they're out of context and if you allow me the time to explain both of those emails the first one refers to the fact that I had talked to director Muller about possibility if I'd found it necessary to appoint a special counsel whether he would be available it was really a determining whether I had that option I had not made a decision whether to appoint him and Jeff Sessions as many of you know is one of the most principled people have ever met in Washington he recused from that investigation his position was I'm not going to discuss it I'm recused from the investigation so what happened there was that General Sessions had reached out independently to director Muller to ask him to come in for advice about whether to about a new FBI director there are a lot of things going on at the department at that time one of them was the appointment of a new selection of candidates for a new FBI director and so that hasty email which I know some in the media of misconstrue I was simply alerting director Muller when you talked to the boss attorney general sessions keep in mind he doesn't know anything about the Russian investigation and it's an example senator of how these things can be misconstrued it's actually a very innocent email same thing with the other one and that's a little bit longer of a story but it also related to the search for an FBI director I believe when I sent that email I was actually in the White House counsel's office I was meeting with the deputy White House Counsel and we were talking about potential candidates for FBI director and I had been speaking with the former Deputy Attorney General you have in mind trying to encourage him to apply for the job and he was resistant he was reluctant to apply for the job and I was actually lobbying to get him to apply for the job in fact I asked Greg cats us to call one of our former attorneys general to talk to a former Deputy Attorney General and encouraged him to apply and I think when I said I'm with Muller I meant that literally that mother was with me at the White House and when I said you need to step up I meant he needed to step up I was encouraging him that former Deputy Attorney General to step up and apply to be FBI director so it's a completely innocent email I certainly understand out of context how it looks nefarious but I can assure you senator I've been in an apartment I had been in the department for 30 years those emails are all preserved I wouldn't be putting anything of Farias and emails hopefully I wouldn't be saying any nefarious at all but certainly wouldn't be putting in an email so late thank you thank you for being here you know I've not been shy about the fact that I even noted it was Senator Lee and they join an op-ed in the Washington Post last month that the FBI had made serious mistakes during surveillance a former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page the Faisal renewal application presented to you for approval in June 2017 was one of those committee already held a hearing on this last December after inspector general Harris released his 474 eight page report Oh said you have that with you those are crossfire hurricane which became the broader Russia investigation counterintelligence investigations into Paul Manafort George papadopolis Michael Flynn all of whom were convicted of felonies and Carter page though the only time as I understand the FBI applied for physis surveillance order in these five investigations the only time they did was was with respect to Carter page is that correct that's my understanding a sir thank you and the 17 errors the inspector general found with respect to the Carter page Feist application all came after so they would not impact the launch of the broader Russian investigation is that correct I believe that's correct thank you now the Moller report is 448 pages do you know how many pages of the 448 referred to Carter page I do not I'll let you know at seven so seven pages on that 441 on other matters so I I mentioned this because there's a kind of page case demonstrates a FISA application process itself is flawed it's not subject to no scrutiny another report last March the special general found that a 29 FBI applications for physis surveillance he reviewed 25 or 86% of them had an average of 20 issues each that's what I mean about the scrutiny now the intelligence community made a unanimous assessment that was shared by the bipartisan the Republicans and Democrats alike in the Senate Intelligence Committee the Russia interfered in our elections do you agree that the FBI's errors in the Carter Page case don't undermine those unanimous assessments yes yes I do agree thank you so we do have then the unanimous assessment within the intelligence community and the Republicans and Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee Russia interfered in our election now I believe this is interference that the Trump campaign welcomed and attempted to exploit that mr. Putin are you listening and so on any argument suggesting that the Russia investigation should have never occurred and the American people should be in the dark about Russia's interference in our country's election in 2060 and I find that deeply troubling I believe that sirs Vladimir Putin's interest more than ours I believe you would agree with me that we should not have any countries whether it's Russia or anybody else interfering with their and free and fair elections in this country is that correct I do agree with you on that senator and as Deputy Attorney General and for a while supervisor the Russian investigation the Special Counsel reported to you before you saw any indictments the special counsel provides you with an explanation of his charging decisions including against a dozen Russian nationals and military intelligence officers as well as Paul Manafort Michael Flynn and George papadopolis you didn't object to those charging decisions or the indictments is that correct it's true that I did an object senator but mmm I actually don't sign any indictments but you found nothing to object to him I was not aware of any reason to object any charges and while supervising the Russian investigation you never reject an explicit request by the special counsel to take a investigative step or pursue an indictment is that correct that's correct thank you very much I want the Chairman to notice you did well like my colleagues on the other side I kept exactly five minutes you you set the standard for the rest of right thank you but you did mention a very important point and I can't remember what it was and I'll think of in a minute senator Cornyn mister Rosenstein I know you've dedicated your almost your entire adult life to serving at the Department of Justice and I know you love and revere that institution and the people that work there and rightly so but I can only imagine how disappointing it must be to you now to learn following the revelations of the Inspector General's report and other investigations some of the facts and circumstances leading up to leading up to the investigation of the Trump campaign first of all let me take you back to director Comey you wrote a memo I believe it was in May of 2017 recommending to President Trump that he fire director Comey correct my memo to attorney general sessions yes sir excuse me you're right yeah there's a memo to the Attorney General and then then that was forwarded to the president and your principal concern as I recall it in that memo was that director Comey usurped the role of the Department of Justice when he held a press conference on July 2016 where he said that Hillary Clinton was extremely reckless in the way she handled her email server and but he said that no reasonable prosecutor would prosecute her and thus in the process of saying well she's probably not going to get charged with a crime but nevertheless let me tell you all about all the derogatory information that was in violation of the norms and the right rules and regulations of the Department of Justice correct yes and you concluded in your memo - director excuse me to turn attorney general sessions that he would probably do that again since he saw nothing wrong with the way he handled that correct I don't recall my exact words senator but but I actually I have it in front of me I think it's about the last sentence or so it's important that we have an FBI director who recognizes that that was wrong yes sir and so this was an example of the FBI getting involved in a political in the midst of a presidential political campaign and holding a press conference talking about derogatory information that they discovered but then saying no reasonable prosecutor would would prosecute can you explain to us why it's important that the Department of Justice including the FBI doesn't get involved in the middle of political campaigns yes senator I think there are a couple of issues there one obviously is the sensitivity about campaigns the other is the principle that the Department of Justice doesn't disparage people our prosecutors conduct investigations and if they determine that they believe the evidence warrants prosecution and it meets the principles of federal prosecution then they returned indictments and the jury and judge decide about guilt if we don't indict people senator it's not our job to disparage them and so that's why I wrote that memo it's also why I believe it's unfair and unfortunate that that Carter page FISA was leaked because the principle here senators we conduct investigations we presume people innocent and we don't disparage them unless and until we have evidence that warrants prosecution well given the policy of the Department of Justice not to get or get involved during political campaigns and to attempt to influence those it strikes me as unprecedented that in the 2016 timeframe you had open investigations of both candidates running for president both the Democratic nominee and the Republican nominee would you agree with me that there is no precedent for that in American history that's correct let's talk a little bit about how the FBI handled the investigation and crossfire hurricane we've talked about the steel dossier as you know at the time Christopher Steele was on the payroll of fusion GPS to do opposition research for the Democratic National Committee on behalf of the Hillary Clinton campaign he was also retained as a confidential human source by the FBI correct I don't know all the details senator what I do know though is that whoever was paying him as one issue the other issue is what was the basis for believing he was credible did the FBI have an appropriate basis for believing it was credible and the Inspector General report suggests that if a Miss stated that or overstated their basis for believing he was credible well the Inspector General noted that that Steele said I don't work for the FBI I work for fusion GPS I'm a businessman but I may pass some information that's useful to the FBI do you remember that I know that from the report yes sir so at the same time that he was a confidential human source for the FBI he was on the payroll of fusion GPS during opposition research for Hillary Clinton's campaign he was ultimately terminated by the FBI for violating the rules by leaking information to the press but he continued to backdoor information to the FBI through Bruce or correct yeah that's my understanding I don't know the chronology of winning was on the payroll of huge in GPS but generally I believe that's correct and with the Chairman's indulgence let me ask if we can put footnote 350 on this on the screen I asked Attorney General bar back in May I think it was of 2019 I said can we state with any confidence that the steel dossier was not part of a Russian disinformation campaign his answer was well that's one of the areas that I'm reviewing I'm concerned about it and I don't think it's entirely speculative well we know the bill pre-snap who's in charge of the counterintelligence division said they did consider the possibility that Steele was a part of a Russian disinformation campaign but then thanks to the diligence of Senator Grassley and Senator John and the Director of National Intelligence we now have a copy of the less redacted footnote 352 the inspector general report which points out if you can see it that not only did steel have regular interaction with Russian oligarchs but that the there was a potential information potential for Russian disinformation influencing Steel's election reporting and it did not have high confidence that the sub sources for Steel's reporting and sucess that the reference subset was part of a Russian disinformation campaign to denigrate u.s. foreign relations so mr. Rosen style it strikes me that mr. Putin must be extraordinarily pleased with how this all played itself out not only was Hillary Clinton and her campaign disparaged not only was President Trump and his campaign disparaged and put through what can only describe as hell for the last three and a half years of an investigation when in fact the source of some of the information that was used not only to secure a FISA warrant but to conduct a counterintelligence investigation may in fact have been part of a Russian disinformation campaign does that concern you it concerns me very much senator and I'm at a bit of disadvantage as you know I was in the job for only two years I've been gone now for about 13 months so I don't have access to any information that's been generated through the dirham investigation I do not know what Attorney General Barr has discovered with regard to that but I think it's important senators for us to keep in mind that it is it is established I believe that Russia's efforts included disparaging Hillary Clinton as you said that doesn't mean Russia is on the other candidates side Russia is on Russia side and so I think we should be just as concerned if there's evidence that they were disparaging or attacking or trying to undermine president Trump as we were about their activities with regard to secretary Clinton's I don't know the answer to it but I'm concerned about it I agree with you the point I was trying to make is the crossfire hurricane investigation based almost entirely on the allegations of Christopher Steele and the sources he provided which may have in fact been part of a Russian disinformation campaign which has successfully divided the country and created a lot of chaos and in the ensuing three and a half years Thank You mr. chairman if I could just follow up on that Senator whether it's Russian disinformation or other disinformation I think the FBI needs to figure out yeah where did it come from why was it submitted and where any crimes committed I think that's an appropriate area of investigation I just don't know what the evidence reflects think Senator Durbin Thank You mr. Rosenstein Thank You mr. chairman I miss baseball obviously a lot of Americans miss baseball as well they're broadcasting old baseball games now and I'm watching them and I'm wondering today the people who've tuned in to this hearing over c-span of the Senate Judiciary Committee must think they're watching a rerun a classic hearing of several years ago on the Moller report but unfortunately this is not a rerun this is the priority of the Senate Judiciary Committee today today in June of 2020 those who tuned in might have expected that we'd have a hearing concerning the public health crisis facing America the pandemic which were fighting every day which has claimed over a hundred thousand American lives they might think we would consider the issue of profiteering and this pandemic within the jurisdiction of this committee but we're not perhaps we take up the issue of privacy and contact tracing an important issue but we're not taking that up either they might wonder if we would actually have a markup to establish legitimate public health standards to protect Americans and American businesses but we're not they might even wonder if we would take up the issue of racism in the administration of justice and America certainly a timely topic but we are not they might wonder if we would ask a question about President Trump's suggestion 48 hours ago that he would have a federal militarization of law enforcement across the United States certainly a significant constitutional issue but no we're not taking that up today instead we're taking up the Muller report an investigation that was completed more than a year ago why we're taking it up because it has become a bloody shirt on the right listen to what the Attorney General of the United States said two weeks ago in a quote at a Department of Justice press conference about the investigation mr. Rosen's sign which you were in charge of it was a grave injustice and it was unprecedented in American history the law enforcement and intelligence apparatus of this country were involved in advancing a false and utterly baseless Russian collusion narrative against the president the proper investigative and prosecuted standards of the Department of Justice were abused in my view in order to reach a particular result mr. Rosenstein the Attorney General of the United States called it a false and utterly baseless Russian collusion narrative against the president there been other things said to the chairman of the committee on December the 9th described the FBI's counterintelligence investigation as an endeavor that quote became a criminal conspiracy to defraud the court to trample on the rights of an American citizen mr. Corda page he went on today this morning and talking about whether we she has any lawful predicate to appoint Muller to begin with he called the hurricane crossfire one of the most corrupt biased investigations in the history of the FBI mr. Rosen Stein that was an investigation as you were in charge of he was conducted by an individual that you personally selected do you consider it to be an utterly baseless corrupt criminal investigation as you reflect on it today I do not consider the investigation to be corrupt senator but I certainly understand you know I understand the president's frustration given the outcome which was in fact that there was no evidence of conspiracy between Trump campaign advisers and Russians we're about to embark on an investigation by this committee which may be the largest investigation I've ever witnessed here tomorrow I understand the Chairman is going to ask for authority to issue 53 subpoenas for witnesses what an irony that we began this year in an impeachment trial where the Republicans refused to produce one document or one witness not one witness when it came to questions the impeachment the president tomorrow there will be 53 names submitted and they will not be cleared with the minority as I understand the proposal by the Chairman he alone will have the authority to decide which ones to call we will attempt to amend his subpoena on the Democratic side to make sure that if we are clearly trying to find the truth in this matter about whether this was an utterly baseless investigation we believe we should also be calling a few other witnesses how about Michael Cohen who negotiated a trumped our mouseka deal until at least June of 2016 perhaps Paul Manafort repeatedly passing campaign information to constituent Clem mnek who had Russian intelligence ties Constantin Clem Nick himself manna forts Russian national business partner partner which Muller found to have Russian intelligence ties Rick gates deputy chairman who instructed man afford to feed campaign information to Clem Nick George papadopolis whose comments prompted the opening of the FBI investigation Michael Flynn Roger stone there are more on the list if we truly want to get to the bottom of this and bring all the witnesses in as to whether this was a baseless claim of Russian collusion with anyone in the United States certainly we want the record to be complete don't we don't we want witnesses to give us complete testimony I would hope so mr. Rosen Stein let me ask you the bottom line question when it comes to what we are considering today mr. Muller whom I respect though I may disagree with and one context or another reached some very basic conclusions in light of any wrongdoing in the FISA Court involving quarter-page and others and all the information you know today mr. Rosen's sign do you disagree with the key finding of mr. Muller that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential campaign and a sweeping and systematic fashion I agree with that finding do you agree the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a trump presidency and work to secure that outcome I don't know what the government was thinking senator I can only tell you what their conduct was do you agree that there were more than 120 contacts as mr. Muller found in his rapport between the Trump campaign and individuals linked to Russia I have no reason to dispute that do you agree the Trump campaign knew about welcomed and expected to benefit electoral II from Russia's interferences mr. mowett found and as a report what page are you Frank you said happy to tell you it's page Volume one pages 1 & 2 [Applause] I'm not sure whether you were quoting from the report senator but I have it in front of me statement within the report volume 1 pages 1 & 2 yes sir I have it right here Trump campaign knew about welcomed and expected to benefit electoral ii from russia's interference do you disagree with that have any reason to disagree with that finding yeah I apologize sir I'm not seeing those words in the report if you can direct me to are is in the report up I'll be happy to I will I don't have it at the moment in front of me but I will produce it do you disagree with the Muller report conclusion the Trump campaign plan to press strategy a communications campaign and a messaging based on possible release of Clinton emails by WikiLeaks volume 1 page 54 that says according to mr. gates that's attributed to mr. gates I don't think that's a finding of the Muller but it's it's what one of the witnesses said do you have any reason to believe it's not true I I have no no information beyond the fact that the witness Senate senator the bottom line is this for over a year this report has been public it has been debated it has been parsed analyzed and the bottom line conclusions have not been disputed though there may have been some wrongdoing involving any one person in the investigation it still it boggles the mind that the Attorney General of the United States would say this is baseless I yield thank you and I'll turn to sinner lady minute but I'm gonna respond if I may about what I'm doing in what I believe and all of us believe that if the Republican Party had paid mr. Steele through an organization money to dig up dirt on Hillary Clinton and he used a Russian to create a bunch of garbage it was used to get a warrant against a Clinton campaign ah but if you'd have a little different view of this that you would be raising holy hell and all your friends in the media would be front-page news everywhere treason but it's Trump it's okay long as you're out to get somebody you need to get damn the way you do it well this committee is not going to accept that standard my friend this committee looked at everything you wanted us to look at in terms of Russian behavior did Russia interfere you better believe they did will they do it again yes they will was this the Ukrainians no it was the Russians who stole the emails it was the Russians who have divided the American people in terms of the 2016 campaign but it wasn't the Russians my friend who withheld information from the FISA Court keeping Carter pages life turned upside down it wasn't the Russians who refused to tell the court that the underlying dossier that was a crucial to the Carter Paige warrant was a bunch of garbage it wasn't the Russians who manipulated an email to keep getting a warrant against American citizen it wasn't the Russians who withheld information from the court about general Flynn that they were setting him up and out to get him it was the Department of Justice it was the FBI it was people who hated Trump if people had a political bias an agenda to destroy him before he was elected and after he was elected and we're going to get to the bottom of it and if you want people subpoenaed I will certainly listen to what you got to say but this stinks this is a sad episode in the history of the FBI there was no there there in August 2017 and it may not bother you but it bothers us and I hope it will bother the American people and we'll fix it senator Lee on June 29th 2017 you signed off on the third phase of renewal application did you read that application yes so you having been asked to sign off on it you had read it were you aware of the multiple errors and omissions that were later discovered and disclosed by the Inspector General no were you aware that the information provided by a Christopher Steele commonly referred to as the Steele dossier was the basis of the assertions in the FISA application I believe senator that some of the assertions in the application are from Steele my understanding is but only some we're aware of the fact that the Steele dossier which you've just acknowledged was at least the partial basis for this who was bought and paid for by the Democratic National Committee and shared with Hillary Clinton campaign I don't believe I had that detailed information at the time okay so you you're being asked to do something significant you're asked as the Deputy Attorney General the acting Attorney General in this circumstance to sign off on something and yet you don't have a critical piece of information that's a problem yes it seems to me it's a problem especially given that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act can be used can't be manipulated and in fact has been abused and manipulated to us so as to spy on a presidential campaign a campaign turned out to be for the man who became the 45th president of the United States were you aware that the app characterized Christopher Steele's past work with the FBI as a confidential human source and failed to include information from his source questioning his reliability no I was not aware of that if you had known about these errors and omissions as of June 29 2017 would you have signed off on it No why not senator my understanding is that these five applications follow a followed a very rigorous process and and that they were accurate that they were verified the whole principle of having an agent sign it under oath is that you can rely on the facts and the whole point of having the Deputy Attorney General sign off on them was to have somebody who would be accountable to someone who was in turn accountable to the voters who could verify their accuracy is that right and yet that did not happen I don't think that the idea is for the person who the the person who approves the filing which is the Attorney General the deputy or the national security assistant or in general to personally verify the facts it's to make sure the accurate process has been followed and that the document sets forth a proper basis sure it did supportive but surely this process isn't an ass the the process isn't fair simply to provide cover to do something unlawful the process is there ideally one would hope to make sure the rule of law is respected correct before you became the the acting Attorney General in in in this context didn't you would it's at some point get a sense for the politicization within the FBI at the top level of the FBI even beyond Jim Comey no you didn't have any sense that there was a targeting of a presidential candidate and and later someone who became the president of the United States I did not have that impression what was the legal basis for appointing Robert Muller and didn't you become concerned at some point about the composition of Muller's staff let's take for example mr. Weissman mr. Weissman is now fundraising for Jill Biden as is his right previously he was an advocate of the Hillary Clinton campaign and did that bother you that you had known Democratic operatives overwhelmingly Democratic lean people who were part of his team it would have been preferable senator to have a more politically diverse group but if they follow the rules their political ideology wouldn't matter hey if if if everyone followed the rules political ideologies wouldn't matter and well but senator I had Bob Muller in charge of this and and based upon that and based upon my conversations with him I'm fairly confident that the political bias did not enter into that investigation at any point were you asked by any member of Congress to launch a criminal investigation of President Trump I don't believe so getting back to the FISA application process why didn't you the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court - appointed amicus curiae given the obvious sensitivities of this investigation senator I have to tell you in context you asked me about reading the the FISA there are a lot of FISA applications that come through some are more significant than others this one was unusual in that I already knew about it because of the Russian investigation most of the FISA applications that are presented to me I'm the last eyes on them before they're filed to the court and I know nothing about them this one I actually knew a fair amount about and they gave it to me in advance so I could review it not sure I read every page but I was familiar with what was in it but it actually if you read the report I know you most people haven't seen the unredacted version but my recollection of it I haven't seen him for some time as it was actually fairly persuasive and so and it already been approved three times this was just a reauthorization thank you no you indicated moments ago that mr. McCabe did not lie to you but you also acknowledged that he was not fully candid what's the what's the difference well you know lying is when you have somebody a direct question you get a false answer candor is when you're forthcoming with information that somebody needs to know and I believe senator that mr. McCabe should have recognized that when I became acting Attorney General I needed to know about mr. commis memos we need to understand that he did not tell that to me until a couple of hours before they showed up in the New York Times what so what and when did he tell you about the Comey memos and when should he have done that and all they didn't he he he waited for at least a week before telling you about some of the Intel related concerns weren't you his boss correct and so he had an obligation to tell you and yet I don't know if you had a legal obligation senator but you know my philosophy as a manager was that you have a responsibility to tell the boss things that you you know they need to know right and that's a pretty important thing that I would have needed to know and so that would have been regarded as material the omission of that had you been aware of it probably would have been grounds for termination if I had asked him and he had misrepresented it yes Thank You mr. chairman I see my time is expired why yes Thank You chairman welcome back to the Incredible Shrinking Judiciary Committee mr. Rosenstein we used to have a say in Circuit Court nominees now nothing protects them even having to come from our state's we gave that away we used to oversee executive privilege claims now a witness others the word privilege and we shrivel up we gave that away we used to screen out extremists and unqualified judges now it's hard to see any bottom to whom will confirm we gave that away and we faced the danger now that this committee this historic committee is going to begin running political investigatory errands I think facing that risk it is worth having some assurances about how this is going to be conducted and I say this based on the experience of looking at the House Intelligence Committee and the Republican side of that committee and its efforts to disparage and interfere with the Muller campaign that has not yet been fully investigated I don't believe that Muller investigated any linkage between the House Intelligence Committee Republicans efforts and the White House or their efforts and Trump's lawyers but I strongly suspect that the House Intelligence Committee Republicans were advised controlled or directed by Trump lawyers either in the White House or on the Trump legal team and that sorry experience if that is in fact the case again investigation would reveal it but we have had no investigation should not be replicated in the Senate Judiciary Committee I hope that we can receive appropriate assurances here that whatever investigation we undertake will not be controlled by the Trump White House and will not be controlled by the Trump campaign as we pursue this oversight one other aspect of The Incredible Shrinking Judiciary Committee is that we used to require the FBI in the Department of Justice to answer our questions now we just get ignored there is a bin someplace at the FBI and the Department of Justice into which our questions get thrown and mr. Rosenstein you were sworn in on February 1st 2017 as Deputy Attorney General you resigned from the department on May 11th 2019 in between those dates we had hearings on May 2nd 2017 May 24th 2017 June 27th 2017 October 18 2017 December 6 2017 February 6 2018 March 13 2018 June 12 2008 eeen June eighteenth two thousand eighteen June 26 2008 eeen July 18 2018 July 31st 2018 December 12 2018 and May 1st 2019 with Department of Justice witnesses and none none of the committee's questions for the record were answered ever none can you explain why that took place mr. Rosenstein under your watch where was the policy not to answer this committee's questions did it come from you did it come from the Attorney General did it come from the White House did it come from OMB why where qfr is never answered where was that policy founded senator I recall answering some correspondence letters are a whole separate issue I can got a whole separate case on those but I'm focusing now on committee questions for the record why not where's the policy from I told you not to answer these questions where did that come from where is that in the department I know that I testified in my confirmation hearing which was in March of 2017 and I answered questions for the record I believe in following including there may have been some from you after that hearing these are all the ones I listed and in all of them no questions for the record were answered that's a lot of hearings with no questions for the record answered where do they come from I don't believe that I testified at any of those hearing senators side it's just not know I'm thinking that there's a policy at the Department of Justice not to answer committee Q FRS that's the only explanation unless you think it's a coincidence that in all those hearings no Q FRS got answered something's up and it makes me really frustrated a particularly we said a letter to chairman Graham all of us on February 11th about this of this year because it has gotten so frustrating that there is a policy somewhere in this administration not to answer committee QF ours and now we can't even get a qfr answer now that a clear blue sky the first thing we're investigating is the exact thing that the Trump campaign wants us to investigate the only time we ask for anything from this department is when it's a political errand and every other time you can't even get a decent qfr answered ever and I can go through the letters that I haven't gotten any answer to either but there is a stone wall and we should not be selective about whose information gets through the stone wall at the department and this mr. Rosenstein happened on your watch my time is up sooner wideout Center crews Thank You mr. chairman Oh may I ask a qfr yes you may as to what the heck is going on with our non-response to QF RS that one may go in the bin at the Department of Justice as well with all the others that never get answered but the day will come I agree when there is a Democrat Department of Justice and Attorney General the day will come when there is a Democrat sitting in that chair and a policy that you don't ever get qfr is answered by the department that we oversee is not a good policy it is someone's policy and I want it stopped thank you very much and as to the hearing yesterday there were a lot of questions asked about kovat 19 and prisons and I expect hopefully those will get answered particularly senator Blumenthal's questions about the court case so point well made senator Cruz thank you mr. chairman prior to 2016 and 2017 the worst known instance of abuse of power by an administration was Richard Nixon's abuse of his administration to target his political enemies by any measure what the obama-biden administration did in 2016 and 2017 makes everything Richard Nixon even contemplated pale in comparison and Richard Nixon rightfully faced impeachment and ultimately resigned as a consequence of his misconduct the evidence that has been made public has made clear that the Obama administration targeted his political opponents targeted President Trump in his campaign Unleashed weaponized and politicized the Department of Justice the FBI and the intelligence community and that the decision making to do so went right up to the very top we know that on January 4th 2017 the FBI concluded in two document that has just been released that there that General Michael Flynn was quote no longer a viable candidate to be part of this larger case their investigation did not yield any information on which to predicate further investigative efforts the FBI is closing this investigation that was January 4th 2017 the next day James Comey the director of the FBI is sitting in the Oval Office with Barack Obama with Joe Biden and James combing according to a memo from Susan Rice one of the most remarkable cya memos written in Washington written on her last day in office an email to herself saying by the way this investigation into the National Security Adviser coming in to the new office the president has said do it quote by the book she says by the book three times James Comey tells the president we're investigating Michael Flynn by the book well unless the book is Richard Nixon's Watergate the day before the FBI said they were closing the investigation and there's James Comey telling Barack Obama were going after general Flynn a decorated three-star general the incoming national security adviser the president with Joe Biden sitting right there nodding alone Joe Biden himself personally unmasks Michael Flynn's name that's the world you came in to mr. Rosen's on that's the Department of Justice you came in to where it had been corrupted and politicized you've read the Inspector General report mr. Rosenstein I've read most of it yes sir you've read the 17 repeated material misstatements documented within the inspector general report I have read that yes sir you're aware one of those is a lawyer fraudulently altering an email creating counterfeit evidence that became the predicate for a sworn statement in the FISA Court that is in the general's report yes sir are you aware of other instances the Department of Justice employees fraudulently creating evidence to submit to court every instance that I'm aware of senator would be appropriately investigated and and hopefully appropriate action would be taken mr. Rosen Stein on May 17th you appointed Bob Butler the special counsel On June 29th you signed the third FISA application on August 2nd you sign the second scope application you came into a profoundly politicized world and yet all of this was allowed to go forward under your leadership that unfortunately leads to only two possible conclusions either that you were complicit in the wrongdoing which I don't believe was the case or that your performance of your duties was grossly negligent was there at standard senator was there any more important case the Department of Justice had that an investigation into whether the president the United States is a Russian asset colluding against the United States well that's the way you're characterizing the investigation senator there was certainly lots of important investigations but I viewed this is one of the most important okay you just told senator Lee you read the FISA application at the time you read the FISA application did you know that the primary source behind the steel dossier had disavowed it and said it's not true at the time I reviewed it and I'm not sure I read every word but I certainly reviewed it and no I did not know that at the time you reviewed it did you know that there was significant exculpatory material that was omitted from absolutely not at the time you reviewed it did you know that a lawyer on your staff had fraudulently altered material as a basis for a FISA application that Laura was not on my staff but I was not aware of it was on the FBI staff correct and the FBI reports the Deputy Attorney General correct at the time that you reviewed it did you know the steel dossier was paid by the d-ends paid for by the DNC I don't believe so did you ask any of those questions well the questions I would have asked senator would have been is the information represented to me verified and I would anticipate senator that if somebody knew that it wasn't or that there was some issue about the credibility informant or the accuracy the evidence this is what mr. Rosen Stein when you're going into a department that has been politicized I understand it's easier just not to rock the boat not to question the people there but you were the acting Attorney General of the United States had had a responsibility not to allow political targeting let me ask you did it strike you as strange and my time has expired so I'm going to leave this is the last question did it strike you as strange that the FBI and the Department of Justice was going after a three-star general the incoming national security advisor to the president who they already said they were going to dismiss the case against and their predicate for all of this was is the Logan Act which you know perfectly well is an unconstitutional law that has never been no one has ever been prosecuted under in the history of the Department of Justice and should have been laughed out of the room at any responsible Department of Justice if someone had suggested we're going to go after the incoming National Security Advisor for violating the Logan Act which says an American citizen can't talk to a foreign leader I guarantee you today right now John Kerry is violating the Logan Act now fortunately it's an unconstitutional law so who cares why did you not laugh this out of the room and why didn't you get two answers on this why did you let this pile of partisan lies consume the country for to you senator I appreciate you packed a lot into your question I know the time is limited first of all senator I think it's not accurate to say that we didn't rock the boat you may be aware when I went into that job with attorney general sessions we actually made a lot of significant changes wasn't just about the Russian investigation there was a lot more going on in the Department of Justice and so I would not have been reluctant in any way to rock the boat if I believed that there was something improper going on with regard to general Flynn to take that particular issue senator my understanding at the time that I arrived was the general Flynn had lied to the vice president and two FBI agents and that I believe was the primary issue that was under investigation at the time I didn't know all the background that appears in the pleading it was filed by the US attorney in DC but you didn't bother to ask you didn't actually bother to drill in and say show me the background you know this may be the most important case we've got in the whole country let me actually do more than just rubber-stamp the document put in front of me I don't believe I was rubber stamping senator and I fully appreciate your concern and obviously you always wish you could have done more but we did have 70,000 cases filed that year I devoted more attention in this case than to anything else but I still didn't know everything and so that's the best I can give you soon thank you Thank You mr. chairman welcome back mr. Rosen Stein I made very clear that I think that it is absurd to be having this hearing I know we're gonna have a hearing which I appreciate on criminal justice reform in a few weeks after the murder of George Floyd in my state but I think we could also be doing so many other things on the pandemic on the effect that the pandemic has had on immigration policy but we are here today I thought that was absurd but then I heard senator Cruz and I have to say to compare Richard Nixon to Barack Obama Richard Nixon who left the White House in disgrace to compare him with President Obama who left the White House with grace and with dignity something we've missed very much especially this week when we saw the President of the United States using the Bible as a prop in front of a church in Washington DC after the Justice Department tear gas peaceful protesters in order to set the stage for that press conference no I would like the record to reflect that this comparison is not only wrong today between Richard Nixon and Barack Obama it will never stand the test of time so let me start with this mr. Rosenstein you appointed special counsel robert muller to oversee the FBI's counterintelligence investigation to ensure that it was conducted independently in May of 2017 the Special Counsel found that Russian interference in our election was sweeping and systematic and that the investigation as you know ultimately resulted in 34 indictments of individuals and the convictions of six of president Trump's associates and advisers on federal charges last May you said that there was quote overwhelming evidence that Russian operatives hacked American computers and defrauded American citizens end quote as quote part of the comprehensive Russian strategy to influence elections promote social discord and undermine America end quote do you still agree with that statement yes I do are you aware of any facts that call into question the finding and the special counsels report that the Russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion or that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome are there any facts according and the report senator I I certainly believe that director Mellors report accurately reflects his conclusions okay obviously I don't know what's in the mind of the Russians we can only evaluate the evidence that we have and that's what the intelligence suggests okay are you aware of any facts are calling to question the assessment of FBI director Ray which is by the way backed up by many many Trump intelligence officials that Russia's interference in our elections is ongoing that it's interference in the 2018 midterms in Christopher Raids words were a dress rehearsal for the 2020 elections are you aware of anything that would lead you to think that Russian interference in our elections going forward has done I am not aware of anything that would suggest it stopped and while I was in office senator I actually spent a fair amount of time working with director ray and other officials to try to combat foreign interference okay and given the threat to our democracy posed by foreign election interference while we by the way the threat of voter suppression due to this pandemic and other laws it is critical that we remain focused on the facts the Inspector General's report found on page 17 that the investigation the crossfire hurricane investigation was open to determine whether people associated with the Trump campaign were coordinating with the Russian government do you disagree with that that is my understanding senator and so we are clear coordinating with a foreign power as part of a political campaign especially a foreign adversary like Russia would pose a threat to national security is that correct it would if it were true yes okay and do you agree that interference in our elections by foreign governments constitutes a national security threat yes okay so that is why I would like to look forward and when you look forward what you see in front of us you see this ongoing threat to our democracy which is why I have advocated so strongly along with Senator Lankford senator Graham so many for back up paper ballots in our election it is part of the reason why I think that the mail-in ballots in addition to protecting the health and safety of voters would protect us from foreign affair insan' that's why you have Republican dominated states like Utah have used these mail-in ballots it would be helpful in that way and one other policy idea here is that we need to do as we continue to see ongoing attempts by foreign governments to influence our elections on social media Senator Graham and I and Senator Warren have put forward the honest ads Act are you familiar with that bill no I'm not okay well that is a bill that would require the same disclosure rules and disclaimer rules for political ads that we have her ads that we see on TV I would simply require that when someone gets an ad for a political campaign or an issue ad that's paid for and meets the federal standards that they would in other forums that you have to have a disclosure on them and that you have to make a public record of this ad and I just want to again remind my colleagues of this bill because after years Senator McCain first did this bill with me it's still sitting dormant and I think that when you look at what the Senate Intelligence Committee just recommended was that we should bring our laws into the 21st century to ensure that voters are able to know who is paying to influence our political system at the very least when we know we also have unpaid influence do you think it would be helpful to know who is paying to influence our political system senator I'm very lucky to express a view about your legislation okay for the moment but I'll be happy to take a look at it I really appreciate that Thank You senator Holly Thank You mr. chairman I just want to start by by noting my surprise to hear from my Democrat colleagues that the Moller report is now of no consequence after what they put this country through for years on end endless investigations millions of dollars spent an impeachment inquiry against the President of the United States and now we hear from person after person on that side of the Dyess that the Moller report is of no consequence no consequence I kind of happen to think that the successful weaponization of the FBI by a presidential campaign by the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign for the first time in American history getting the FBI to submit to a federal court false information false information to get a wiretap during a presidential campaign I kind of think that that is a relevant piece of information that maybe ought to be within the jurisdiction and the cognition of this committee of course now my Democrat friends say there's nothing to see here because now we have one of the largest scandals ever doing golf the FBI and the DOJ let me just remind you mr. Rosen's sign about what the FISA Court said when it found out that it had been systematically lied to by the FBI and the Department of Justice that's what the court said sua sponte on its own and I quote the FBI's handling of the Carter page applications as portrayed in the inspector general's report was ant ascetical to the heightened duty of candor that is owed to the court the frequency with which these representations made by FBI personnel turned out to be unsupported or contradicted by information in their possession and with which they withheld information detrimental to their case calls into question whether information contained in other FBI applications is reliable in quote in other words the FISA Court now wonders if it can trust anything that the FBI says anything now you signed off on a FISA application to a federal court in an ex parte proceeding which means the other side didn't have any chance to argue it you signed off on it it had 17 material misstatements falsehoods omissions you signed off on it you also said at the time you thought it was an above average application right how could you sign off on something with this number of misrepresentations that the FISA Court later came back and said this this destroys our trust in the FBI you signed off on it personally how could this happen I approved the submission of it and and for federal judges signed off on a to senator because like me they believe that the information had been verified and was accurate did they have a duty to verify the information no the agents had n duty diffuse effects oh so you did not have a duty to verify the information is your name on the application well I had a duty to make sure it had been there did you rubber stamp it senator the Deputy Attorney General or the Attorney General just answer my question did you rubber suit he said a second ago senator Cruz said I did rubber stamp but if you'd like me to explain I will let I serve but you also testified today that you didn't read it so I'm curious I didn't say how was it you would you like us to have your testimony read back to you said I can't say that I read it I don't think I read every page I mean yes I did say that yes but okay so you didn't rubber stamp it but you didn't read it you know senator I have to explain the process oh I think we're familiar with the process Oh Oh IG gave us the process by the time it got to you you had 17 critical errors falsehoods omissions leaving a federal court to say they have never seen thing like this and they can't trust anything else the FBI says and you signed off on it let me ask you this who are we to hold responsible you're saying it's not you no no I'm saying senator that I am accountable for it but the question is why did it happen now I'm no longer in the department but there are people who are there who I expect we'll figure out why it happened and we'll fix the problem so I'm not trying to give any theories about what the problem might be I only know what the inspector general's report reflects senator and again I've been gone for 13 months so I have no insight why don't you agree with me that a process that is so corrupted that it resulted in the abuse of a federal court in an ex parte proceeding during a presidential campaign is a threat to American democracy it's a threat to the integrity of our elections would you agree with that it's a it's certainly a threat to the integrity of the judicial system and the FISA process but I need to explain to you senator that you know when you're running an organization with a hundred fifteen thousand people you're not gonna be able to personally verify the information I know so I and that's why you can't be held responsible it's nobody's fault the FISA Court has been misled the FISA Court has seen we can't trust anything the FBI says but nobody's to blame for it so let me just ask you who should we hold responsible what what do you want this committee to do the other side wants us to do nothing they don't want to talk about it they're happy for these abuses to go on apparently what do you suggest that we do I think senator they're issues of accountability and blame I'm accountable I'm here being chastised by you and that's part of my accountability but the question is blame what went wrong and we need to figure out what went wrong and I think when you say I signed off on it it suggests that my responsibility was to actually do the investigation and verify the information that that's just not the responsibility of the deputy there's possibilities to make sure we've got an accurate process in place that guarantees the integrity of the applications but that really the process wasn't in place turned out that it wasn't exactly and so if I'm at fault because I had a reason to know that or should have known that I should be blamed for that but I just don't know I didn't see that in the IG report I didn't see him blaming me or my predecessors and and that's all I know about it senator so I certainly am accountable for it but in order to solve this problem yelling at me is not going to the problem we need to figure out what happened the people engage in this conduct are the systemic problems and fix them so it won't happen again yeah of course well thank you mister Rosa sign for your service and and we'll certainly I'm sure this committee will take every pain not to hold you accountable or responsible apparently we can I am accountable or responsible mr. chairman so I don't know what this committee is left to do but I do know this what has happened is unacceptable and we've heard the FBI director sit in the seat that you're in mr. Rosas signs say he's not accountable he says he's not making any changes in fact he's done nothing the current FBI director to address this situation nobody seems to want to do anything meanwhile we're in another presidential election year I look forward to hearing about how the FBI has weaponized the FISA Court again in this election year who knows we'll be hearing about that in two or three years from now this circumstance is simply not acceptable mr. chairman and that's why I'm glad we're doing this but we've got to hold somebody accountable for it senator as I said yes I'm sorry mr. chairman if I could just finish the answer that again there are questions of accountability and questions of blame and it is the responsibility of director Ray to solve these problems and and I don't know I'm not familiar with you mean I certainly hope that yes solve these so here's what's happening we have recommendations from Horowitz how to make sure this doesn't have it happen again we've got mr. Durham looking at criminality and it's up to this committee to come up with a process hopefully bipartisan where we can make sure this doesn't happen again and we're on it I think it's important and I think it's important Center Coons be called on right now mr. chairman if I could just follow up though because I'm accountable I feel accountable for anything that went wrong in the department on my watch but I think the issue is how do we fix a prior sentence Thank You mr. chairman thank you make sure this is mr. chairman mr. Rosenstein thank you for your testimony today and for your service we have some important questions in front of us as we know president Trump has often repeatedly and loudly called the entire Russia investigation of witch-hunt but inspector general Horowitz found the FBI had an authorized purpose when it opened crossfire hurricane which was grounded in protecting our national security and investigating federal crimes do you agree with that conclusion yes I do do you believe the whole Russia investigation was a fraud and a witch-hunt no in your oversight role over the special counsels investigation see if you can get him a new mic there can you get is my microphone working thank you very much excuse me let me try again that much better if I might mr. chairman I'm just gonna start again absolutely thank you mr. Rosen Stein thank you for your testimony and for your service and for your appearance before us today President Trump has called the Russia investigation a witch-hunt which is in sharp contrast with inspector general Horowitz who concluded that the FBI had an authorized purpose when it opened crossfire hurricane which was grounded in protecting our national security and investigating federal crimes do you agree with that conclusion I agree with inspector Horowitz his conclusion yes sir in your oversight role over Special Counsel Muller's investigation did you ever raise a concern about the appropriateness of the investigation and prosecution of Michael Flynn I was not aware of any reason to question the appropriateness at that time you were the acting Attorney General for that investigation did you approve of his guilty plea yes sir based on my understanding that the evidence demonstrated is guilt and he and his attorneys admitted his guilt did you ever raise any concerns about whether Flynn's false statements were material to the FBI's national security investigation I was not aware of any issue and are you aware of any precedent for the of justice moving to dismiss a case after a defendant pled guilty to lying to the FBI I don't know the answer to that senator there may be I'm not personally aware but the department certainly has moved to dismiss cases in the past you authorized filing the indictment in the Roger stone case as well correct correct and a jury convicted Rogers let me Evon felony if I could just clarify I believe that I don't believe I was acting Attorney General at the time the stone case was filed so I'm certainly aware of it but I don't know that I as a legal matter I don't know that I authorized it in any event a jury ultimately convicted Roger stone of seven felony counts in the indictment do you think Roger stone committed those crimes of which he was convicted based upon the jury's verdict yes and in the Roger stone case career prosecutors filed a sentencing motion and the political leadership of the department filed a different motion within a day the career attorneys then withdrew from the case and one went further and resigned from the department are you aware of any other recent case where political appointees filed a sentencing recommendation that is so markedly different from what career prosecutors had filed I understand your question senator I the only issue I would take with it is that technically every pleading we filed contains the name of the US Attorney you're focusing on whose signature appears on the document but all those documents are filed in the name of the US attorney and I considered US Attorney's responsible for them do you think a president should publicly criticize question or attack ongoing Department of Justice investigations I'm not gonna comment on the president senator as I think I've made clear I understood the president's frustration and I don't think it's my job to comment on how he articulates that well the president has recently referred repeatedly to something he calls Obama gate which he has repeatedly said is worse than Watergate and repeated efforts by members of this committee by journalists to get any clarity or definition about what Obama Gate is have come up without any clear are you aware of any evidence that former President Obama has committed any federal crime I am NOT there's been a lot of discussion in this hearing in particular about the car to page Faisal warrant and the findings in the inspector general's report that I think are worthy of concern and focus Carter page though was not indicted in the Muller investigation correct correct not indicted and presumed innocent unfortunate that that FISA information was leaked and in fact by the end of it the president's campaign manager deputy campaign manager national security adviser foreign policy adviser personal attorney and longtime political strategist were all either convicted of crimes or pled guilty in federal court you approved of the significant investigative steps in those cases and approved the filing of those charges is that correct as I said I don't know that I was there for the last one but I believe all the charges that were filed were legitimate and in January 2020 you were quoted in the Washington Post saying certainly in retrospect there are things I might have done differently but I think we got all the big issues right do you still think that you got the big issues right yes sir right I wasn't referring just to Russia there were a lot of big issues obviously and I believe we did we being the team we had in place at the department that I believe we got the big issues right well I'll just close by saying you know I too am questioning the scope and the reach of the dedication of time of this committee to reinvestigating what I think inspector general Horowitz is thoroughly investigated we are in the middle of three simultaneous national crises a public health epidemic an economic sharp short downturn and understandable nationwide protests inflamed by anger at the brutal and public killing of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police there are many other pressing issues that I hope this committee will soon turn to and I appreciate your testimony before us today thank you senator thank senator Coons and I assure you we'll get to other issues but I guess I guess I just say this for calling on our next senator the FBI was told in January the dossier was not reliable here's a bar talk by the primary sub source gave mr. steel all the information and the warrant was renewed on two occasions after that in April and June he says he didn't know about that sculpt or information being withheld I think it's okay to ask everybody who signed the warrant did you know is this really one FBI agent in the bottom of the basement somewhere who did all this by themselves I don't think so senator Tillis thank you mister thank you Thank You mr. chairman they I appreciate you holding this hearing it's remarkable to me that people on the other side of the diets here thinks that this is a waste of time I think that this is a very important part of oversight and preservation of the integrity of our our justice system by the way senator Durbin's not here I love baseball too and the reruns are pretty good as a matter of fact I got emotional watching the sixth game of a series with Atlanta until I realized that it was about 20 years ago but the league here in the sentence working senator Durbin's comments would suggest we're not doing anything else this is one hearing of several hearings we're doing this week I would remind everybody we had a hearing making sure that we're doing the very best we can for our prison population ANCOVA 19 response just yesterday I would also talk about hearings on implementing the cares Act and the Banking Committee happened this week there was another game that got played yesterday I would also talk about a number of other hearings that are specifically focused on doing everything that we can to keep running I for one think that a that although our leader McConnell has been criticized for us being here it's remarkable to me on the one hand we have people saying shame on you for being here and on the other hand saying shame on you for doing anything else we're doing a hell of a lot here and a lot of its focused on the kovat response but the integrity of the Department of Justice and the FBI I think is probably worthy of having a discussion over that's the discussion we're having here also heard some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle speak dismissively with the idea of a hoax or a witch-hunt well I decided to go on the Oxford online so I had a reasonable source and hoax is described as a malicious deception a lot of what we're talking about here are malicious deceptions or omissions let's let's remove deception and omission the omission of a truth and some some of the online dictionaries is actually tantamount to a lie a witch hunt is described as a campaign directed against a person or a group holding unpopular views well we've seen the email transmissions by some of the people who were responsible for the FISA warrants looks like to me they had a different political view viva la resistance so I actually believe that hoax and witch-hunt may be contextually accurate to describe some of the things that went on with this Moeller investigation and let me tell you this is pretty personal to me because mr. Rosenstein you may remember that I went on a bill with my colleague across the aisle to make sure that we were able to keep more in place and to continue the investigation I did that premise on the assumption that I could trust the people that were doing the damn investigation and now I know I couldn't I still stand by the fundamental position that I took but I'm a little bit angry with what's happened here and mr. Rosen Stein in your opening comments you mentioned that you had three hand-picked teams three hand-picked teams that were working on this investigation and based on my research I believe that page struck incline Smith were on one or all of those teams now also believe that by virtue of them not providing information to you that they're guilty of a hoax they're guilty of a malicious deception information that they had access to now a hand-picked team mr. Rosas Stein would you say that's your you're trying to pick some of the better players you're taking people off the bench that you consider to be some of the better ones in the department I would hope that that's what the so do you think that these people would have had enough training and experience to know that withholding that information to their boss was probably something that was a bad idea I mean just does this rise to a level where we can say awestruck page clients it was just an oversight the damning information we found in the horror was report can we honestly believe that these highly trained people could have just said gosh boss I forgot about that material fact when I gave you information for something for you to sign senator I do not know that it was struck paged inclined Smith I don't believe those allegations are in the IG report but whoever it is I think should be held accountable I do too and I think it goes far beyond disciplinary action the the other thing that you said was with respect to McCabe and you said he was not completely forthcoming and and I think you may have alluded in an answer to one of the questions asked by my colleagues that at least ethically maybe he had information that would have been helpful for you to have that sounds like a deception to me too that sounds like the omission of him for me this is a smart man a very capable well-educated experienced person why on earth would something like that with all the attention being placed on it could any reasonable person think other than the fact that it was a minute because it could have materially affected your view of what had gone before Sarah I don't want to speculate about what was in anybody else's state of mind well I will and I think it was because they were trying to move towards a outcome that fit what some people and the lower levels of the organization had in mind you can't read the emails between some of these people you can't look at some of it I'm not an attorney I'm not a Solicitor General I'm not a prosecutor but it doesn't take a lot agree to recognize that these were basic these were not mistakes these were intentional actions and it's why this hearing it's why the subpoenas and why this investigate needs to go forward because to your point your opening statement the vast majority of people in law enforcement the vast majority of people in the DOJ and the FBI have been disgraced as a result of the at worst incompetent actions and at at best and at worst the malicious actions of a handful of a few and we have to get to the bottom of it senator Blumenthal thanks mr. chairman I want to join as a former prosecutors US attorney and State Attorney General in expressing my agreement that we owe a great debt of gratitude to the men and women in state and local police and the FBI and law enforcement generally as we do to our United States military that are helping to keep us safe and free and my fear is that that immense power may be misused by political leaders who apply them in ways that in fact interfere with our freedoms our constitutionally guaranteed right and that's one of the reasons why I will join next week with my colleague senator Kaine and offering amendments to the National Defense Authorization Act that would restrict the president's power to misuse that military and police force in fact to federalize and militarized law enforcement and that's why also I will introduce measures that would restrict the over-broad and virtually undefined powers of the president under the insurrection act so that he will be held accountable and while we're talking about reform and the chairman has said we should be looking forward let's talk about FISA reform and if we're looking for ways to improve and that law and prevent any sorts of errors in the future why not adopt those reforms I've advocated I'm looking for Republican partners in that effort as I did under President Obama when I first suggested for example that there be an adversarial process in the FISA process to make sure that any errors were eliminated the president the chairman has said that the Moller investigation went quote off the rails if that investigation was off the rails that's a pretty remarkable train to deliver the results that it did and those results included 199 criminal charges 37 indictments nine convictions five prison sentences let me ask you mr. Rosenstein and I should just remind you at the very outset I was the only member of the committee who voted against you I was I'm well aware of that senator I was one of this six on the floor of the Senate who voted against you and my reason was solely that you refused to commit that you would appoint a special counsel and then you did and I lauded you for it and I defended you for preserving the independence of that investigation let me ask you is it your testimony today that had you known then what you know now that you would not have appointed robert muller to serve as special counsel i believed at the time senator i still believe it was the right decision under the circumstances i recognized people can criticize me for it that's that's the consequence of being in these jobs you make decisions and then you get criticized for them but i believe it was the right decision at the time and is it your testimony today that if you had known then what you knew what you know now that you would have intervened in or stopped that investigation but based on what i know senator no but I don't know everything and I'm open to the possibility there's more information that may come out and if more information emerges well let me tell you let me give you mr. Rosenstein a quote that I think is dispositive today and dispositive probably for the future and it comes from the inspector general whose report you have in front of correct quote we don't take issue with any part of the special counsels report let me repeat it we don't take issue with any part of the special counsels report that was his testimony before this committee in December when he presented his report so after all of the umbrage and outrage and heated political rhetoric the report and its conclusions and findings remain unchallenged by the inspector general would you agree I do and I think it was important senator to establish that an independent investigation found that the Russians sought interfere in the election and no Americans conspired with and I think those are very important findings and I'm grateful to the folks who helped us reach that conclusion and far from saying that the Moller investigation is of no consequence in fact it is of immense and historic consequence because it shows as you said and I'm going to quote you there was overwhelming evidence that Russian operatives hacked American computers and defrauded American citizens and that is only the tip of the iceberg of a comprehensive Russian strategy to influence elections promote social discord and undermine America that was your characterization of the work that is immensely important what we're saying is of no consequence is in fact all of this stuff about quarter-page about the steel dossier because at the end of the day the reason why that report is of consequence is it shows that the Russians interfered and the Trump campaign welcomed it senator I'd I think it's important to recognize and I believe I was consistent throughout my tenure as Deputy Attorney General and trying to make this point that the Russians are on the Russian side they don't affiliate with the Republican and Democrat Party they're on the Russian side and and they are an adversary for interfering in our election that offends and should offend everybody regardless of your politics and the reason why we're here today really is to deflect attention from an economic crisis health care emergency demonstrations in our streets and communities that legitimately ask for justice and if we want to fix the problem what we should do is face a reform not rehash a set of allegations that is in fact of no consequence because the reason why you began the investigation and why the department began the investigation was first the Russian government hacked the Democratic National Committee second WikiLeaks published 20,000 emails stolen from the DNC and third a Trump campaign official bragged to a foreign government that Russia told the Trump campaign it could help them through the anonymous release of damaging information on Hillary Clinton that's what set off the investigation the only issue I might take with that is that I I didn't begin the investigation I did end the investigation but the investigation had begun nine months before but those are the those are the reasons that the investigation began karate I wasn't there so I can't attest to that Senator Ernst thank you very much I appreciate you being here today mr. Rosen Stein and and for appearing before the committee today I am NOT a lawyer I'm not going to apologize for that I appreciate some of the eloquent speeches that we have heard here eat earlier that we have heard a lot of passion coming out of a lot of people and I appreciate that I'm just here as an American and as an Iowan and most Iowans aren't lawyers but I can tell you that most I wonder whether they're watching c-span Fox News CNN whatever today and they're saying what the heck has gone on in these institutions you know I was a kid watching you know CBS or whatever back home cross-legged in front of my TV and and watching all these law enforcement shows and thinking God how awesome is the FBI you know to a small rural farm kid that's a big deal you know to see those blue jackets with those yellow letters and it really is very awe-inspiring but what we have seen in the last couple of years has really tarnished the FBI's their reputation it's tarnished do J's reputation and I don't know that a lot of kids nowadays are looking at the FBI and saying wow someday I'd love to be wearing that blue jacket because there are some real issues there that need to be addressed not just by prosecutors and others but there are answers that need to be had for the American people and I'm sorely disappointed in everything that's gone on and and I'm glad that we're having this this hearing many of my colleagues across the Dyess would like us to believe that we can't walk and chew gum at the same time here you know for heaven's sakes we have convenience store clerks that are working every day through the pandemic essential workers I think that here in Congress were essential workers to and so we should be here addressing some of these issues so I am glad you are here and that you're willing to step up and take this criticism I understand you're not serving as the da Jie any longer but you're here to answer questions for us so so thank you for doing that we've got to get to the bottom of this under the obama-biden administration and with the holdovers the the integrity of the entire FBI has been called into question by a political element that existed and maybe still exists within the FBI and this is not something that we can allow to continue to happen we need the FBI we need the good guys back and I know that there's still many of them that are out there but we need the American people to understand this is an agency that is there to protect us you know it is it is again the epitome of of what we should see in our agencies and that that has been damaged so whether you're a Democrat a Republican independent or whatever we really need the old FBI back we don't need what we've seen in the last number of years so mr. Rosen Stein you were confirmed as the daj in April of 2017 and we know that you had direct contact with at least one of those spies the applications while serving in that position and I'm sure that you've dealt with many others but speaking generally on the topic of FISA surveillance do you typically want the subject to know that you're conducting an investigation on them absolutely not for a number of reasons can you expound yes why not well number one it the whole principle is it's a covert investigation you know the suspects know you're looking at them obviously they're much less likely to engage in open communications that would allow you to discover what they're up to number one and number two which is a point that I emphasize senator throughout my career the people we investigate are presumed innocent and we have a responsibility not to damage them by the investigation the investigate is not supposed to be the punishment and so it's very important not to disclose those investigations very good but on on June 29th 2017 you were briefed on and signed then that third FISA renewal application regarding Carter page extending the FISA surveillance of page until September of 2017 and at that point at which the third faisal renewal application came to your desk for your signature the news about the surveillance had already been leaked to the media is that correct correct so at that point Carter page knows that he's being served surveilled he's being investigated that the FBI wants to continue conducting surveillance on him what why did they want to do that because they believed that the extension might generate relevant evidence the fact that he had already been publicly known obviously is a factor you would expect to consider but my understanding was that notwithstanding that they still believed that the application met the standard for generating relevant evidence senator but I think that's a very insightful and valid question yeah it is a very valid question and so why did why did it happen then did you raise any questions about that when you were briefed on that third application yes and what was that conversation it's the fourth application so it's the third extension third extension thank you but yes and I was told that they had considered that and they believed that it warranted one more extension my understanding was it would be and in fact was the last extension but it's based on the legal standard actually requires the affidavit set forth new information and there is new information in the third application third pardon me a renewal for Thap location that appeared to justify extending it well to just again an average person not a lawyer I would say that the the reason to continue surveillance on someone that already knows they're being watched is truly as a political tool it's political interference and I think that's why so many of us are so disappointed in in the FBI in DOJ and we have to see those Corrections so again I am thankful that we are having this hearing I think it is very pertinent that we address this now as we're involved in another presidential cycle we really do have to find and hold accountable those people that committed these crimes what I see as crimes so thank you very much I can't if I could just respond to one or two brief points actually number one with regard to the political interference suggestion it was my understanding at the time senator that mr. page at least in June of 2017 hadn't been involved in the campaign wasn't working in the administration so I did not view that as as targeting any kind of political information I understand the question and I think we're in a different context obviously in June than we were in September but the Inspector General Horowitz's report I think accurately reflects that the application itself appeared the state a proper lawful basis and obviously I wouldn't have approved it if I believed it was targeted to getting campaign information and the second issue I really appreciate your raising because I I grew up with those television shows too it's one of the reasons I spent 30 years in law enforcement and since I'm here at under oath senator I think it's worth taking the opportunity to tell you that I have worked with many many federal agents over the course of my 30-year career many attorneys in the Department of Justice and I want to reassure you senator that some of the finest people that I know are employees of the FBI and the Department of Justice so while these are serious problems they need to be fixed I want you to know that that confidence that you have in the men and women of the FBI is justified thank you thank you senator Krueger know who'll be joining us telephonically is up next Thank You mr. chairman we're in the middle of a pandemic we've now crossed the grim milestone of more than 100,000 people having died from code 19 tree is in turmoil because last week Minneapolis Minneapolis Police Officers openly murdered George Floyd in full public view and what was the crime that he allegedly committed that led officer Derek Chopin to shove his knee into mr. Floyd's neck for more than eight minutes a claim that a $20 bill he used was fake the marks of injustice in this case are painful traumatic and unbearable but sadly not isolated in our country as we have seen too many times in the past few weeks alone racism in our country is clear and long-standing in the midst of all this turmoil this committee is having a hearing or something that we have already covered exhaustively it has already been covered exhaustively by the Justice Department's inspector general in a nearly five hundred page report where they interviewed a hundred witnesses reviewed a million documents and found no documentary or testimonial evidence the political bias or improper motivations influenced the FBI investigation moreover the investigation was open for an authorized purpose under proper factual predicates in fact we know that Christopher Rea our FBI director has already implemented some 40 corrective steps based on the inspector general's report so this hearing waste this committee's time in a blatant effort to support the president's cause big conspiracy theories and to help the president's reelection how can these aims be proper use of this committee's time mr. Forrest that was the inspector-general cirrhosis died in September 2018 the New York Times reported that you have suggested wearing a wire the secretly required President Trump after he fired FBI director Comey and linked the firing to the Russian investigation the article also reported that you discuss recruiting cabinet members to invoke the 25th amendment to remove mr. Trump from office on April 26 2019 The Washington Post reported that after the New York Times report you were in danger of losing your job according to the post when President Trump called you for an explanation you tried to assure the president you were on his team when discussing Special Counsel Muller's investigation you reportedly said quote I give the investigation credibility and quote and quote I can land the plane mr. Rosen dr. Stein did you tell the president I can land the plane regarding Special Counsel Mahler's investigation you packed a lot into there I hope you'll allow me to answer number one the idea that I was involved in some conspiracy to get the president is ridiculous and I think that I worked for two years with well you know what you can respond to my specific questions regarding without wearing a wire but this first question is did you tell the president I can land the plane I do not believe I've ever used those words I can land the plane senator and I have not ever talked about my personal communications with the president but what I can tell you is what I always said when anyone asked me about the investigation which was that we would complete it appropriately and expeditiously and I made no inappropriate commitments let me ask you the question about did you suggest or hint as secretly recording President Trump I do not suggest or hint at secretly recording President Trump I have you have you ever discussed with anyone the possibility of invoking the 25th amendment to remove this president from office ever in any way suggested that the president should be removed from office under the 25th amendment like an even more detailed explanation if you have time we all know that that attorney general barb they certain characterizations of the mother report which I would say we're not accurate but he did say in a letter that he wrote to Congress he said Deputy Attorney General Rob Rhodes ensign and I have concluded that the evidence developed during the special counsels investigation is not sufficient to establish that the president committed and obstruction of justice offense this attorney general bar accurately present your view regarding the obstruction of justice senator I do not believe that the evidence collected by the special counsel warrants prosecution of the president that is correct oh that's not that was not my question I mean it has nothing to do with whether collusion was found Lee we also know that they that President Trump did not cooperate fully with Butler's investigation on that point no you did note a number of obstruction of justice actions by this president so did you agree with the bars letter that you agree that there was no obstruction of justice involved I'm sorry sorry that's what I try to answer the first time the answer is yes I do not believe that the president committed a crime that warrants prosecution and that's the issue that we review as prosecutors no excuse me they said the Moller report said that they did not find enough evidence to to go after the president for collusion and we all know that the office of legal counsel said that the president a city person cannot be indicted but they did raise a number of obstruction of justice actions by the President and left open the issue of whether or not that would be indictable but we all know that they obviously legal counsel so you can enjoy sitting president and by the way more than 1,000 formal former federal prosecutors who served under both Republican and there pratik administration's disagreed with you regarding the obstruction of justice issue and they wrote that baby the president Trump's conduct described a special council of mothers report would result in multiple felony charges for obstruction of justice and quote they emphasize that these are not matters of professional judgment they further noted that to look at these facts that say that a prosecutor could not probably sustain a conviction for obstruction of justice runs counter to logic and experience so can you explain why you are right and more than 1,000 former DOJ prosecutors are wrong on the issue of obstruction of justice by this president senator we have a lot more than 1,000 former DOJ prosecutors and I don't know whether all those people read the entire report or we're familiar with all the evidence but but I was and I believe Attorney General Barr has already explained his conclusion and Senator I think it's very important when we complete investigations we reach conclusions and the department determines a case merits prosecution or it does not and we determined that that case does not merit prosecution now people are free to express contrary opinions and because I think I have to repeat myself again I've read them all the report they did not say that there was not enough evidence with regard to obstruction of justice they know that and I disagree with Muller I don't know why he didn't come to the conclusion that there are there was actually enough evidence on the obstruction of justice issues but that they could not she could not indict the president that part is really clearly good I think that's unfair senator because the investigation was concluded it was appropriately reviewed no one recommended in favor of prosecution the Attorney General and I determined the prosecution was not warranted and that is I think that question has been asked and answered I appreciate it very much senator Crapo Thank You mr. chairman and mr. Rosen Tina I just wanted Rosen stone I want to clear up a few issues here first of all once again we've heard here from some in the committee that inspector Horowitz his report which you've read and discussed with us today found that there was no evidence of bias in the activities of the FBI and in the crossfire hurricane investigation I think that's clearly not what he found but first let me establish this in the report itself the Inspector General found that the crossfire hurricane teams receipt of the steel election reporting on September 2 in September 2016 played a central and a central role in the FBI's and the Department's decision to seek the FISA order do you agree with that I'm aware of what was in the FISA application and I understand that people who were more directly involved like mr. McCabe have testified about that so I didn't know everything that they knew but that's my understanding all right thank you now with regard to this question of whether there is bias this is one of the main reasons we're here and this hearing today as to what happened and why the problems that arose came with the inspector general as we all know found 17 significant violations of process and procedure that resulted in you stating here earlier today that had you known them you would not have signed the FISA requests correct in that context he did indicate his I've read that he found bias but that he could not prove that the bias was a cause of the decisions that were made do you agree with that yes sir I think that's the way I would characterize it that he it's not that he didn't find bias it said he didn't find evidence that the bias affected the outcome in fact the phrase that he used and which is now very common is that there that he could not find documentary or testimonial evidence that the bias caused the decisions made by the team correct I don't recall the exact words but I accept that I asked the inspector about that when he was here testifying before us about his report and he basically confirmed that and I saw I concluded it with him saying so how did you try to find out if it bled into the decision-making if the bias did and he said I had you know I asked those who had the bias and I asked those who were making the decisions and they said no they didn't exist you know they didn't let bias cause their decision-making and because I could not find documentary or testimonial evidence otherwise I concluded I couldn't prove that there was bias in the final decision-making that's how I read it at that point I said to him that I found it inexplicable actually I think he used that word I found it mind-numbing I think is what I said to him that you could not see the bias bleeding into the decision-making and he responded to me by saying I said how could you not reach that conclusion basically he said there is such a range of conduct here that it is in explicable and the answers we got were not satisfactory that we are left trying to understand how could all these errors have occurred over a nine-month period of time or so among three teams handpicked one of the highest profile with not the highest profile case in the FBI going to the very top of the organization involving a presidential campaign so he said he I think he was saying he thought it was inexplicable I said to him I understand that I think it is explicable I think it was bias my question to you is what do you think I think it's a very important issue senator I think the important thing to keep in mind and again I have the experience of three decades in law enforcement our goal is for the Department of Justice be non partisan its operations our people are not nonpartisan though we have people with very strong political views on both sides I have my own political views obviously the Attorney General's always have political views and our line employees do too the goal is to train them about the way they go about their work to exclude political partisan considerations from their decision-making so what was concerning about the information the inspector general turned up was that it wasn't our employees had political views it was that their political views appeared to be influencing their conduct of the investigation at least based on what their messages suggested now the Inspector General completed his investigation and he reached his conclusion but Michael senators number one is to avoid actual political influence number two is to avoid the appearance of political influence which is very difficult so I encourage you to keep in mind we don't require our employees to have no views we just encourage them to set their views aside when they're doing their work I understand that and I understand the difference between the appearance of political influence and the reality of it and my question goes to the fact that when you've got as as the Inspector General said when you have all of these are 17 significant errors one including a criminal act of changing a document occurring over a nine month period of time among three teams hand-picked on one of the most high-profile cases in the country isn't there a point at which you must say that there's a real possibility that this appearance is real well it's an appearance that the work was not done properly whether it was a result of bias or negligence or failed policies I think that's something the general bar needs to address and I believe you will well you indicated that the outcome of the special counsels investigation was that we found that Russians did commit crimes seeking to influence our election and that Americans did not conspire with them that's correct yes sir and then I'll just conclude with this I'm going right back to your introductory comments and that is as you concluded your testimony you indicated that the Inspector General concluded that so many basic and fundamental errors were made by three separate hand-picked teams on one of the most sensitive investigations that FBI officials expected would be subjected to close scrutiny raise significant questions regarding the FBI chain of command management and supervision of the of the fysop process you still stand by that yes sir I always emphasize to my subordinates that it's very important for us to follow the rules because we don't follow the rules people are going to question our motivations and so it's certainly understandable that you would be concerned about that and my hope is that the Attorney General will be able to put in place new policies and if people committed misconduct or crimes they'll be held accountable for them I think there was way more than just significant questions about the FBI's chain of command management I think there's significant questions about whether bias bled into this investigation thank you very much senator Crapo certain Booker mr. chairman thank you very much I'm finding myself repeating a theme from earlier in this this last few weeks which is I just don't understand why we as a committee or focusing on things that further deepen the jangling discords of partisan posturing in America I might be missing something but to me were in a pandemic like we haven't seen since 1918 and the economic crisis like we haven't seen since the Great Depression and uprisings all across America like we haven't seen since 1968 and yet I've been down here for a month or so the first hearing in this committee we held for a judicial seat that's not open till September and now we're doing something that is affirming discord in this country at a time that the hurting in America right now that we could actually answer that by having a committee hearing on the issues that speak to the heart of our country right now I talk to people on both sides of the aisle not just in my state but on this committee in this Congress about what we could be doing together to deal with the issues that are related to the savage murder of of George Floyd and there's good will I tell you that that we could demonstrate right now I know that the Chairman is going to have some committee hearings but I just come from a school of thought that justice delayed is justice denied and and our delay in meeting the urgency of this moment is problematic I know the goodness on the other side of the aisle hell I think I'm senator Kennedy's second favorite quarry and all the Senate and so I'm just gonna repeat for the record things that have been said first the Justice Department Inspector General has found unequivocally that the FBI's investigation into the links between the Trump campaign and Russia had a legitimate basis those are the words and was not motivated by political bias that is the Inspector General's word second Special Counsel Muller appointed and overseen by mr. Rosa seen identified quote numerous links between the Russian government and the Trump campaign and found that the Trump campaign quote expected it would benefit elect Tora Lee from Russian interference I quote the president United States Russia if you are listening come on and finally in third special counter Muller's investigation resulted in a total of 199 counts against 37 people and entities with seven guilty pleas and two convictions at trial there is simply no question that this investigation was justified and there's simply no question that foreign interference was a threat to our elections in 2006 and remains one today are we having a hearing on how to stop the Russians from interfering in our elections which are a hundred and fifty plus days from now now who are we having a hearing on urgent issues dealing with this pandemic now who are we having a hearing on the economic devastation happening in our country now who are we having a hearing on the broken criminal justice system that threatens the lives of black Americans every single day in this nation know we're sitting here showing the American public that we argue with each other very well at a time that Rome is burning and so I'm shifting gears because I'm excited to have you here you you're familiar with the crisis going on in this country how did you watch the eight minutes in 46 seconds of the murder of George Floyd did you watch that I watched I'm not sure I watch the entire eight minutes in 46 seconds but I watched it you do you know about the Obama administration's Task Force on 21st century task force on policing I'm familiar with it do you know they had black my life matters people on that that that task force I don't think that I knew that the the big city police chiefs yes so the question I'm looking at my time is up right now but the one question I have and I'm going to submit the rest of mine for the record is that in September 2007 Attorney General shut and those those recommendations of that task force bipartisan task force police officers black life incredible task force have not been implemented I wish we could go into that further but attorney General Sessions shut down a Justice Department program that enabled the office of community oriented policing services call the cops program shut it down that that offices work to do work collaboratively I'm not talking about consent decrees that program had a part that work collaboratively with police departments and issue public reports on how to improve police practices do you think that ending that collaborative reform program made the streets of our nation safer or our Police Department's better senator I don't mean to quibble with you I don't I don't recall that we ended collaborative reform I don't I didn't see any clever reform I said specifically within the cops program there was an effort going on specifically within the under the cops program that was ended is do you not remember that I I'm happy to review it senator I don't have a specifically I will submit my my my questions for the record I'm grateful for grabbing the six minutes that have been allocated to me thank you very much very much before I want to make sure I understand your testimony here mr. Rothstein and August when you sign the scope memo of 2017 you did not know that in January the 4th 2017 the FBI field office recommended dropping general Flynn from crossfire hurricane is that correct senator I have no recollection of that I would think I would remember it right if I'd known it I do not remember that and the evidence has been recently discovered and turned over to the court in his case FBI knows you were not aware of those knows right correct Thank You senator Kennedy Thank You mr. chairman general is I think you know we're here to talk about bias and alleged acts on that bias and it seems to me that it's one thing to talk about bias as a concept or an intellectual proposition but it's quite another thing to see it in living color I want to just read you a couple of emails that I think demonstrate the bias in living color and the promise to act on that bias August 16 2015 Peter struck Bernie Sanders is an idiot like Trump figure they cancel each other out February 12 2016 Lisa pate Lisa page Trump has no dignity or class he simply cannot be President March 3rd 2016 Lisa page god trump is a most loathsome human March 3rd 2016 Peter struck oh my god Trump's and idiot March 3rd 2016 Peter struck God Hitler II should win 100 million in nothing March 3rd 2016 Lisa Paige did you hear Trump made a comment about the size of his penis only she didn't use the word penis earlier this man cannot be President July 18 2016 Lisa Paige Donald Trump is an enormous deuce August 2016 Lisa Paige Trump's not ever going to become president right right August 2016 Peter's struck no no he won't we will stop it now mr. struck and miss Paige were not junior g-men orgy women they were senior officials at the FBI and as I understand it please couldn't correct me general if I'm wrong they were naval deep in misfire Huracan and the mother investigation naval deep they were decision-makers and you you made these emails public which I appreciate but what we're talking about here is not a routine run-of-the-mill FBI case this was an investigation of the President of the United States of America and this was the investigation of a presidential campaign and and here's what I've never understood when these emails became public and you knew about them when he learned about them you did the right thing you made them public presume you've made them available mr. Muller mr. struck and Miss Paige were were removed from the mother investigation nobody get nobody gets fired around here it's easier to divorce your spouse and then fire somebody but why didn't right why didn't you or somebody some other senior official at the Department of Justice or the director of the FBI are somebody else senior at the FBI say wait a minute Holt stop stop a second I need that we're investigating a president and the presidential campaign I'm gonna ask some hard questions here maybe I shouldn't have been trusting people that's telling me this stuff if you or some of your colleagues and the Trump administration had done that you would have seen that the FBI had already said general Flynn didn't do anything wrong and that the FBI agents who tried to entrap him at the White House had said well he's not lying and y'all I'm not just putting it on you but y'all would have found that the steal dossier was unadulterated BS and you would have found that that some people at the FBI had been lying lying to you lying about about the war on the warrant applications and maybe you would have said Wow does does the mother investigation really need to be trying to put Carter Paige and and and general Flynn I mean what's what's going on here but nobody did that and that bothers me yep I appreciate your question senator first of all I have report open in the appropriate page you are correct with regard to inspector horowitz's conclusions he did point out that employees are entitled to political views and I think it's important to recognize I'm sure we have people with strong views on the other side too the question is are you following the rules and are you articulating those views in a way that will cast doubt upon the integrity of the process and when that information came to our attention senator I think we did the right thing inspector Horowitz brought it to my attention and the attention of director Muller director Muller took appropriate action the FBI director transferred mr. struck the investigation wasn't concluded yet so he wasn't able to impose any discipline I believe the woman involved left the department voluntarily with regard to the the status of the investigation senator obviously you fortunately read the conclusion and were able to say that no Americans conspired with the Russians my impression at the time was that there was proper predication for that investigation and general Horwitz inspector general Horowitz agreed with that there may be more information that comes to light and mr. doar may find that and then I think we ought to take that into consideration as well but with regard to all those cases senator I can all I can tell you is and I think one more important point I'd like to make which is why didn't we just throw the whole thing out it's because there are a lot more people involved in this it's not just mr. struck in this page there are dozens perhaps scores of federal agents and attorneys involved and I hope and believe miss most of them were not miss Rosa Stein I think he's asked a very good question once you find out that the people who were in charge of crossfire hurricane also became the Muller and lead investigators and they that they were driven bias why didn't one wooden ear time out to do something like the woods procedure slow down can we really trust the work product to these people that wasn't done was I believe it was but well will you you agree me it was done very poorly well cause you didn't find anything that Horowitz found how did Horowitz find all this stuff and you didn't well Horowitz that that's my internal affairs officers well all I can say is that Senator Kennedy's point is well-taken anybody in their right mind when they found struck in Page were so over the top would have slowed down look what Horowitz did find I just can't believe that all this was laying there and nobody could find it if they really looked I don't believe you're a part of a conspiracy to defraud the FISA Court I don't believe you're out to get the president but his point is that this came this went on for two years and it was clear that somebody should stop and take a timeout and that never happened and when Horowitz looks at it in 2019 he found a ton of stuff they´ll he should our nerve all of us keep in mind senator and I think it's a very valid question yes why didn't I do something and from my perspective that is what I do I refer allegations to an inspector general who works I think the point is he doesn't this thing went on two years and in August 2017 none of the people named in the memo had a tied to Russia at all general Flynn wanted to be dropped out of the thing and the seventh floor kept him in it Carter page was no more a Russian agent than I am a Chinese astronaut Papadopoulos that said many times when he didn't always be in tape you'd be treason to work with the Russians we just don't understand how it started to begin with to be honest with you and I think you were very honest up front saying if you knew then what you know now maybe things would have been different but that's all this is about trying to find out how it went so long rod this is what really bothers me now violence about this circus without a and bothers me but I really believe the FBI is a premier law enforcement agency in all of human history and the American people trust it and you don't want an American when an FBI agent knocks on your door to have to go wow wow I wonder if he's a Republican or Democrat sadly but here you've got a guy like Flynn and I've never met the gentleman but the FBI had already concluded that he didn't do anything wrong there was no collusion and it appears that but they were going to take one more shot some people at that we're gonna intervene them at the White House see if we can catch another line and the agents who interviewed him came back and said well I don't think he's lying and the next thing we know the prosecutors working for mr. Muller are saying here's the deal you're gonna plead guilty to lying to the FBI we're gonna prosecute your kid and we're gonna break you in the process I don't think that's justice I don't care whether you're a trump supporter or a Clinton supporter or a Badham support man that's not justice if it went down that way senator I would agree with you and I understand why you've reached that inference all I can tell you is that I certainly was not under the impression that he hadn't lied as I think I made quite clear I was under the impression that mr. Flynn had general Flynn had willfully lied to the FBI and to the vice president so this fact but under oath that he's fact that the fact that you've put in there that the agents didn't believe that he had lied yeah I don't recall understanding that at the time senator and and I I've read the filing and I'm sure the general bar will give us a full readout at the appropriate time the case is still pending so we haven't heard the whole story but if there's any evidence of misconduct there senator I'm confident the general bar will bring it to light so I don't think we should jump to that conclusion until we've heard from general Barr about that okay thank you Jim thank you very much sir Blackburn Thank You mr. chairman and thank you for being here you know senator Booker asked why were we here we're here because Trust has eroded and and the FBI and Department of Justice and you see this carried out by the Obama FBI and DOJ and people are just they cannot believe this happened and you know I have to tell you mr. Rosen Stein when you think about insurrection generally you think about violence you think about armed criminals they're taken to the streets but there are some plots that are there that are done they're quiet rebellions and they use the cloak of law to shield them and you've got where corrupt officials really exploited their powers to destroy careers you've got partisan hacks that manipulated conspiracy theories to destroy careers to destroy their political enemies and these unsubstantiated conspiracies and this is really what gets us this has wasted a lot of our time and a lot of money and it has destroyed the trust and the Muller witch-hunt tried and failed to get rid of a president and then you had the impeachment and the Democrats tried that that tried and failed and the deal is that the American people should be able to trust the FBI and DOJ to have one set of rules and one standard and that that will apply to everybody and we know that that didn't happen there hasn't been accountability and there seems to be a double standard one for the in-crowd and a different one for the out crowd and let's go back to mr. McCabe the IG caught him lying three times under oath and you've said you did not think he was completely forthcoming I think was your your phrase you used in his conversation with you so if there's a double standard in place do you think that Andy McCabe should be criminally charged with life senator ride I don't express any opinion about that I don't have access to the evidence and so I'm really not in a position to comment on it the evidence being whatever information was gathered through the investigation okay so you have no opinion if he lied and we know he lied if he willfully lied and it was material and it satisfied the principles of federal prosecution then yes then yes don't have enough to be charged okay all right Michael Flynn was a target because he supported Donald Trump correct I do not understand that to be the reason he was at okay then let's look at a double standard here you go back and you look at what happened ten years ago in the Senate when DOJ prosecutors went after the late Senator Ted Stevens and they withheld Brady material and that was vital and relevant and it is a tragedy that senator Sanders senator Stevens was exonerated only after he passed so let me ask you this is history repeating itself today that the prosecutors that went after Flynn and they withheld Brady evidence and they violated his constitutional rights so should the charges be dropped against Michael Fletcher I'm not gonna comment on the pending case but I think it's important for you to know I read the pleading that was five and I know people have jumped to the conclusion that there may have been wrongdoing by the prosecutors I haven't seen that allegation raised by the Attorney General or by us charges you have no opinion if there should be consistence I believe there should be consistency you believe there should be consistency so if you're consistent then the charges would be dropped correct I don't know it's hard for me to compare the two cases for you to say okay i you've got your daughter's here with you today I do and you've got one that wants to be an entrepreneur and is probably not give too many details about my daughters at a congressional hearing in college yes I'm very proud of them let's just say I know that you are proud of them we're all proud of our children and I think many times as a mom and a grand mom to me it is some of that role playing that does the best so let's say your daughter who's an entrepreneur is wildly successful rocks the political system runs for office and wins and then she finds out she's been spied on and then let's say another daughter has followed in your footsteps and gone to DOJ and has become a career a career DOJ employee in his heartbroken when she finds out that some of the prosecutors in the agents are bending the rules and skirting around and using that to spy on a president and she comes to you and says dad what should I do and the other daughter says dad what should I do would you want there to be two tears of justice or would you want there to be one mr. Rosen Stein would you want there to be consistency I would want the resistance you would want there to be consistency exactly right and that is why we're doing these hearings what was done to President Trump and to his transition team I was a vice chairman of the transition team to this day I don't know if they spied on me see this is outside of the rule of law and it is so disappointing to us and I've come here and I've listened to everybody's questions that you want to punt and kick the can and not give us an answer because if we don't get this right and if we don't straighten out what happened with crossfire hurricane and whatever else was in this mix then my children your precious daughters my precious grandsons are not going to have a government that they can believe in and trust to do the right thing I yield my time senator if I could spree flee respond I do not mean in any way to punt it's simply that I'm not carrying the ball at the moment so I'm not in position to know what the evidence is beyond what I'm seeing in the media and I rely on the people who are in authority to take the appropriate action I do not believe that mr. Muller was trying to get rid of the president and as I told you I've I was working with a team of Trump appointees and I don't think any of those people believe now that I was trying to get rid of the president that's just not not not what we were about with regard to general Flynn I think that case will be resolved and if their allegations of wrongdoing they'll be remedied but I do think senator it's not a matter of punting it's simply a matter of reserving judgment given that I don't have access to the evidence at this time well I just want to say as we conclude here that and I've always found you to be an honest man and I don't think you're a part of any conspiracy to get the president but I do believe that general Flynn went through hell that a lot of things were withheld from the court that mattered I think Carter page was abused and I can't believe the system did not pick it up and the fact that it didn't is why we're here make sure it never happens again but there's a statement out I want you to respond to him will wrap up hearing this comes from mr. McCabe mr. Rosen steins claims to have been misled by me or anyone from the FBI regarding our concerns about Trump in the Trump campaigns interactions with Russia are completely false mr. Rosen stand approved of and suggested ways to enhance our investigation of the president further our personally briefed mr. Rosen Stein on Jim Comey's memos describing his interactions with the president mere days after mr. Rosen Stein wrote the memo firing Jim Comey mr. Rosen Stein's testimony is completely at odds with a factual record looks to be yet another sad attempt by the president and his men to rewrite the history of their actions in 2017 they have found in mr. Rosen Stein then and now they willing accessory in that effort would you like to respond yes thank you senator I think one thing you need to appreciate senator is that I had a very strong team working with me at the Department of Justice I had some of the finest lawyers that I have ever met working with me at the Department of Justice it was a team included Trump appointees it included career people I'm sure there were Republicans and Democrats and and that's why I'm confident senator and what I did because I spoke with my team not mr. mchabe I didn't rely on mr. mchabe and I spoke with my team about the actions that I was taking to make sure that they were appropriate I did not say that mr. mchabe misled me that wasn't mom those were not my words I think he's responding to somebody's question what I said was he did not reveal the call me memos to me for a week and that is true and he revealed them to me only a couple of hours before they showed up in the New York Times and he did not reveal to me that he was having internal deliberations with his team about whether to target very high-profile people for investigation and his position is he didn't have to do that until after he had signed off on it and that may be true under the rules as they were written at the time but my view senator was that's the kind of thing that I needed to know and so I haven't accused him of making Mis statements to me I've simply said that he wasn't fully forthcoming and I think that's accurate and I'm confident senator that the folks who worked with me will back me up on that I don't wish mr. mchabe any ill will he's suing over his termination the court will make an appropriate determination about that but the bottom line is senator for whatever reason he did not feel comfortable disclosing that information to me for a week and I think I should have known that earlier and I think I had a right to know it and I think I had a right to know the deliberations in inside the FBI because mr. McCabe knew I had just come into this job I hadn't been around for nine months I didn't know what they were investigating except for what he represented to me and that was my only source of information I didn't have the underlying evidence I didn't talk to the witnesses so you were relying on what you were told by the McCabe team basically right I was relying upon the information that came up from the FBI and I have not made any unfair allegations against mr. McCabe Scindia well all I can say as we wrap up here that mr. McCabe will have the same opportunity you have to sit in that chair or hopefully in a smaller committee room and tell us what happened and the reason that I think he's an appropriate witness is I find it hard to believe maybe it's possible that the sub source the Russian sub source that was interviewed in January and on two different occasions after January 2017 told FBI investigators counterintelligence analyst at the dossier which is the primary document to get a warrant against Carter page was not reliable it was bar talk it was hearsay was never meant to be used the way it was being used I find it hard to believe that when the case fell apart against Carter page in terms of a warrant application it didn't work his way up at the top maybe maybe it's just two people at the bottom that with he'll discover information they never shared it with anybody but that's what we're trying to find out is how could you renew a warrant application in April in June of 2017 when the sub source tells you in January of 2017 the documents you need to get the warrants a bunch of garbage I want to know how you continue to renew those two warrants who knew what when and where you say you didn't know I believe you but somebody had to know and mr. McCabe was the guy most directly in charge so I look forward to talking with him we'll hold the record open and yes please I just want to be clear about one thing have there been any additional facts today that were not in the IDS reports yeah I think what I learned is that the August memo his team consulted with the the Muller team but the information in the August memo came from the Muller people I didn't know that mr. Rosen Stein does that change your conclusion let me just clarify senator when mr. Muller came on board he inherited the team that was doing the investigation so it's true that there the Muller people but they're people that he inherited from the light straight-up struck and page right correct and thinking yeah yeah I didn't know all that but anyway a lot more to find out thank you very much and we'll hold the record open for questions and to be continued thank you thank you sir [Music] you

Channel: NBC News

Views: 943,336

Rating: 4.101088 out of 5

Keywords: Senate Judiciary Committee, Rod Rosenstein, nbc news, nbc, news, breaking news, us news, world news, politics, nightly news, current events, top stories, pop culture, lester holt, Russia Investigation, Former Deputy Attorney General, testifies, frontline russia investigation, us news express, robert mueller testimony, robert mueller interview, news live stream, top stories this morning, world news today live, world news now, world news live stream, Judiciary Committee

Id: uDnPxLxDsvA

Length: 194min 17sec (11657 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 03 2020

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[u/CreativeCarbon]

Hm. This is actually better:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbvXIi7hV5I

NBC doesn't seem to be showing who is doing the questioning.

[u/CreativeCarbon]

8:36: Ted Cruz seems to be trying to turn the entire Russia Investigation into an attack on Joe Biden (and Obama / Comey).

[u/CreativeCarbon]

My god, given the way Lindsey Gram is running this and editorializing it as he goes, it really seems like a complete (and potentially dangerous) farce.

[u/woollyviolet]

I can’t believe they are going through with this bullshit despite the current state of our country. People like Graham, Cruz, Jordan and so on are just as much of a problem as Trump. We need to clean house in November.

[u/nvnehi]

I love how widely Rosenstein is smiling at this guy that isn't letting him answer a question. It's hilarious.

[u/CreativeCarbon]

Surprised no one seems to be talking about this here.