Rosenstein denies plan to secretly record president
WASHINGTON — Memos written by Andrew McCabe, then the acting FBI director, say that Deputy Atty. Gen. Rod Rosenstein suggested he secretly record his talks with President Trump and that Rosenstein discussed possibly trying to remove him from office, according to people familiar with the matter.
The account, first reported by the New York Times, paints Rosenstein as so concerned in May 2017 in the wake of Trump’s firing of then-FBI Director James B. Comey that he contemplated secretly recording conversations with the president.
He also initiated discussions about invoking the 25th Amendment, which details how the Cabinet can decide whether a president is no longer able to discharge the duties of the job, one of the McCabe memos said.
McCabe’s lawyer, Michael Bromwich, said in a statement that his client “drafted memos to memorialize significant discussions he had with high-level officials and preserved them so he would have an accurate, contemporaneous record of those discussions. When he was interviewed by the special counsel more than a year ago, he gave all of his memos — classified and unclassified — to the special counsel’s office .... He has no knowledge of how any member of the media obtained those memos.”
Rosenstein denied the account.
“The New York Times’ story is inaccurate and factually incorrect,” Rosenstein said. “I will not further comment on a story based on anonymous sources who are obviously biased against the department and are advancing their own personal agenda. But let me be clear about this: Based on my personal dealings with the president, there is no basis to invoke the 25th Amendment.”
Though McCabe’s memos assert both the recording and 25th Amendment conversations occurred at a meeting within days of Comey’s firing, another person at the meeting, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, said the secret-recording comment was said in a moment of sarcasm and that the 25th Amendment was not discussed.
That person said the recording comment came in response to McCabe advocating for the Justice Department to open an investigation of the president. To that, Rosenstein responded with what this person described as a sarcastic comment along the lines of, “What do you want to do, Andy, wire the president?”