rosenstein was asked about loyalty pledges. here's with a he had to say. >> is it ever appropriate for the president of the united states to demand an department of justice official or fbi direct or take a loyalty pledge? >> i don't have any opinion with that. nobody has asked me to take a loyalty pledge other than oath of office. >> so at that hearing rosenstein was telling lawmakers, as long as you're following your oath of office, you can be faithful to the administration. the justice department declined to comment and the white house hasn't gotten back to us. clearly, he was uncomfortable with these times of questions and you can see where he's struggling to tell lawmakers that he can be both loyal to his oath of office while being part of this administration. >> i suppose a lawyer could figure out a way to make it technically true. that somebody asking if you have loyalty and making a loyalty request are not exactly the same thing. pamela, your reporting shows the president seemed particularly focused on the december heari

so the release of the memo is targeting rosenstein. but let's remember, as has been said before, what did rosenstein possibly do wrong? and we'll see it in this memo allegedly. but he signed off on a renewal of a fisa application, meaning it already was pending. it already had been approved by a judge. and he had to see productivity that it was a productive wiretap against carter page showing continuing contact and probable cause to believe that he was an agent of a foreign power. that's what's wrong. that's what should be focused on. but instead it's all about targeting rosenstein. >> if the president were to speak with mueller, it would be mueller in person, correct? robert mueller would actually be there, presumably. >> so it's not absolutely required. but if what we're hearing is correct about previous introduce, key interviews, we're hearing reports that mueller is in the room. mueller is sitting back chairing, back benching, asking occasional question. i believe we would see mueller very much front and center at the white house d

the memo might target rosenstein? is rosenstein safe in his role? >> that is exactly one of the concerns that we have. that the so-called nunez memo, a four-page memo that threatens extremely classified information and endangers sources could be used against rod rosenstein. it alleged that information was used in the warrant process in the fisa court, a process that then rod rosenstein renewed and perhaps could be used to threaten him. that is very, very troubling because it could be used as a pretext for firing rosenstein, then robert mueller. that kind of chain of events directly threatens the rule of law. >> if the fbi director, khr

rosenstein: nothing personal. i would interview candidates who wanted to join the department of justice. i always ask them about their career goals to see if they are realistic. time, someone said i want to be u.s. attorney just like you. and i said, that will never happen. bruce knew me. i had no idea what i was doing. i was just fortunate to be in the right place at the right time and to work with the right people who taught me how to go about exercising this responsibility. there's nothing special about me. you are a son, husband, dad, number two person running 100,000 plus government agencies. how do you manage stress? how do you find balance? running the department. i'm helping. i have known most of the former attorneys general. couple have been colleagues of mine. i have talked to some of them. i remember talking to one of our former colleagues and said we are having a challenging issue. where to julie the manual? -- where did you leave the manual? there isn't one. i was talking to larry thompson the other d

and he also asked rosenstein if he was on the president's team. explain why that's not -- >> people talk about being on teams f you're appoint bid the president, in some way, you're on the team. you're on team america, team law enforcement, team public safety. the problem with what is being reported about what the president said there is the tenth or 11th or 12th time you have evidence that the president of the united states, who is supposed to be at arms length with law enforcement, allowing them to do their job independently, without fear of favor, without partisanship and treating everyone equally before the eyes of the law, it shows that that's not how he thinks about things. we have evidence that he asked jim comey for his loyalty, personal loyalty. we have evidence that he told jim comey to lay off a political ally, an employee in the white house, michael flynn. we have evidence that he asked jeff sessions about what he might do to prevent the case from going forward against arizona sheriff joe arpaio and now this evidence that he had this c

apparently brushing off concerns from wray and can rosenstein. they both tried to change kelly's mind earlier this week. >> it will be released and the whole world can see it. >> what changes the next day? do you think things change the next day after, do you think? >> again, i'll let all the experts decide that when it is released. this president, again, it is so unique that he wants everything out so the american people can make up their own minds. if there are people to be held accountable, so be it. >> democrats say the imagine behind the memo, devin nunes, would not reveal whether his staff would work the white house. >> i asked the chairman, did he work with, and i asked all the preliminaries, coordinate, discuss, and he said not to my knowledge. i asked, did your staff? he became quite agitated. >> he released a memo saying, having stone walled congress's demands for information for nearly a year, it is no surprise to see the fbi and the department of justice issue spurious tokss allow the american people to see information related to it.

that rosenstein is the sense that rosenstein appointed mueller and whenever mueller's done with his investigation can decide what to do with it. pair that with house republicans, many of these members on the house intelligence committee who are known to be trump awill lies and tried to support him during a wiretapping drama last year that was unsubstantiated and it does look like there's a concerted effort being headed by the white house to undermine this investigation. >> patrick healy, i'll let you weigh in on this. one other thing, the incredible development with om arosa. we just learned -- we're all laughing at the this. >> are we shocked? >> this person was a senior adviser to the president is going on big brother. she's going to be part of an actual reality show. going from a apprentice to the white house to big brother here. you could talk about the cultural moment. if i'm in the white house and om arosa has said things that concern me. she said she saw things and heard things about race that upset her. how worried are you about this platform? >> she's very mindful about her

rod rosenstein. this memo apparently targets him and his whole role in overseeing aspects of this russian probe. sessions recused himself. he's the guy -- whenever mueller comes out and determines his findings from this whole probe, it's rosenstein, sshlly the gate keeper, who determines how to make it public. do i take this to congress? what do i do with the findings? putting all of this out there on behalf of the president is his way of undermining rod rosenstein. >> yes. and don't forget that if the president wanted to fire bob mueller, he would go to rosenstein, who is bob mueller's boss. he would have to go to rosenstein and say fire bob mueller. if rosenstein refuses to do that or if rosenstein is fired himself, what happens? who goes in that job? who gets that job? does rachel brand move up to that position? would she fire bob mueller if he were -- who knows if, as you peel the layers of the onion here, who knows -- we don't know what's going on, really, as this affects the fate of bob mueller

rosenstein came on board in march. that means that this fisa had already been extended before rosenstein even came on the picture, and that means the judge found that this surveillance was actually collecting valuable intelligence information, so it was a valid fisa. there was a reason to have it in place. this is the kind of thing where these details need to be explained, otherwise they completely misconstrue what was happening. >> it is interesting, maybe it is not rosenstein's role in that, that's an issue here, maybe it is rosenstein's current role which is oversight over the special counsel's investigation. he is the one who appointed the special counsel after all. he's the one that robert mueller needs to go to do make reports on this investigation and if he wants to expand the scope at all, which, by the way, rod rosenstein hinted he let mueller do, he's got to sign off on that. >> that's right. so rosenstein is very key in mueller's investigation. mueller doesn't have to report to him day to day. but he does ne

and that rod rosenstein was involved in writing that letter. additionally, there's no reason to believe that rod's mind has been changed whatsoever based on the fact that chris wray, the fbi director was able to view the memo. it's just another piece of the friction and the very different views between rod rosenstein and president donald trump. >> very different views is one way to put it, and another is that rod rosenstein has a clear understanding that there's a thin line between his current role as mueller's supervisor but also that if rod rosenstein gets canned over russia, he will then be like mccabe and comey, another part of this group of people dealing with this president's very unusual and often times reckless approach to an open criminal probe. that's rod and don mcgahn obviously understand you can be out real quick. turning to the other big story on the memo and your reporting, betsy, in the daily beast, devin nunez won't say if he worked with the white house on the anti-fbi memo. this is a very controversial memo about these misdede

>> it's not surprising that rosenstein is still in the target zone. this is someone who president trump refers to as that democrat from baltimore. this is someone he has complained about since last summer when he gave the order that he then backed down on to fire mueller. what was striking to us is that president trump, who by all accounts has sort of been tamed a bit by his lawyers was still this past week talking about wanting to fire rod rosenstein and more specifically, he was talking about how this memo that now increasingly looks like it will be released would sort of give him the pretext or the foundation to fire him and make other sweeping changes at the justice department. >> well, let's get a couple of the party registration facts down here. isn't rosenstein a republican? and isn't mccabe a nonregistered person? he doesn't register by party? isn't that the case? >> well, rosenstein was presidented by george w. bush and he stayed on under president obama. and as we remember, as the post reported when president trump asked mccabe who he voted

but how about rosenstein? is it his time in the barrel next to use an old roger stone? especially after last night's "new york times" report. all the attention and energy is focused on the attention to fire mueller but what if it's not mueller he's after. >> listening to republican members talking about that encourage from my point of view fire rod rosenstein and put in place someone that will tell bob mueller privately you cannot look into these issues. you cannot follow the money. >> congressman adam schiff ranking member of the house intelligence committee on this program last month saying it would be even more evident to fire rosenstein than mueller. joining me is former acting general in 1999 when he worked under the justice department under eric holder. he helped write the very rules that allowed for the appointment of special counsels like robert muller and today has a new op ed in the washington post. a normal president would know not to try it. thank you for being here. appreciate you being here tonight. >> privilege to be with you, joy. >> let's talk about you

he fires rod rosenstein. that he knows the blowback that would accompany firing special counsel so he fires rod rosenstein, puts in his own person, who then becomes bob mueller's boss who says you can't look into this or into that and you need to end your investigation here. >> if rod rosenstein goes -- do you think that's a valid worry, that he would fire him? >> the i think it's a highly valid worry, what we've been seeing in the press, report about his dissatisfaction with the deputy attorney general. in my experience the deputy attorney general is a stand-up guy. he makes mistakes sometimes, like we all do, but always acts in what is the best for the american people at heart. he could appoint someone with president trump's best interest at heart instead. and rule of law and impartial add j adjudication of justice. >> paul rosenzweig, thank you. >> thank you. >>> we continue on. you're watching cnn. i'm brooke baldwin. breaking news, the fbi has released this rare public statement saying it has, quote, gra

it was deputy attorney general rod rosenstein. and that is reportedly the basis on which republicans in congress and the trump white house are now going to go after deputy attorney general rod rosenstein who oversees the mueller investigation at the justice department and the one figure overseeing the russia investigation the president hasn't fired or tried to fire. they released a memo -- the surveillance warrant against carter page which emerged from the fact that he really was recruited by an actual russian spy ring in new york city. one which ended up with two of the spies fleeing the mus cow and one of the spies going to prison. and the fbi broke that spy ring apart. the fbi knew about that for years. they had carter page in their sights for years because he had been recruited by russian intelligence. all right, at its heart this whole thing, our lives now, right, this whole scandal, the biggest national security scandal to ever afflict an american presidency, at its heart this whole thing remains a scandal about a russian go

but if donald trump tries to fire rod rosenstein, has rosen steen -- rosenstein's replacement fire bob mueller, there will be conflagration around that. i don't think in the end he can escape accountability for bhafr -- whatever is in those files in mueller's office. >> we'll have to leave it there. thank you all -- no, i'm sorry. i have one more question for frank. what happens now inside the fbi? what happens with the rank and file? >> well, i think they're going to want to know the answer to the question was andy forced out for political purposes, or was this a choice that andy decided to make for the good of the fbi. that's going to circulate quickly, starting on the seventh floor of the hoover building and getting out to the field offices. then the rank and file are going to look very closely at the next pick. i would not be surprised if we see someone brought in, a major leader of a major field office, brought in as kind of an un-washington person, that isn't considered to be politicized. watch for someone to come in from a field office. that would be my prediction. >> and before

. >>> and rod rosenstein over the memo. the classified memo says rosenstein approved an application to extend surve surveillance on carter page. the request indicates the justice department had reason to think page was acting as a russia agent. >> rosenstein's appearance in the memo suggests that the republicans will undermine him in the russia probe. nunes says they are cherry picking facts. senior white house aide mark short says the president wants to release the memo but the justice department warned against it. >>> expect twitter reaction from president trump after trolling reached new heights in the spoof called "fire and fury." celebrities from john legend to cher and snoop dogg read exerts and one final reader. >> he had a long time fear of being poisoned. one reason why he liked to eat at mcdonald's. >> that's the one. >> you think so? >> the grammy's in the bag? >> that bit from hillary clinton got big cheers from the new york audience, but not the administration. nikki haley tweeting i always loved the grammys, b

rod rosenstein, of course i know because we were u.s. attorneys together, i think he cold congress when he was interviewed that if the would follow the ethics rules. for many sessir. sessions, he w these meetings, and he was required to recuse himself under rules of the department of justice. at the time when they had a strong ethics department, i'm sure mr. rosenstein was getting advice on that, i don't know where we are right now, i mean the facts of the case could turn to that, i'm not sure where we are now. i do recall, if i'm right, that he testified that mr. rosenstein said that he would follow those rules. >> jameal, listen to jim comey's public assessment, which we now know he has given to mueller, that's new tonight, about why he was fired. >> why do you believe you were fired? >> i guess i don't know for sure. i believe -- i take the president at his word that i was fired because of the russia investigation. it's my view that i was fired because of the russia investigation. i was fired in some way to change -- or to endeavor to

he's be retired at the ripe old age of 49.rosenstein? is it his time in the barrel next? what if it's not mueller he's after? >> listening to republican members talk about a coup and talk about criminal activity in the fbi, that will encourage the president to think he can fire mueller with impunity or perhaps even more pernicious from my point of view, fire rod rosenstein, put in place someone who will tell bob mueller private live you c privately you cannot look into these issues, you cannot follow the money. >> congressman adam shift on this program last month saying it would be even more pernicious to fire rod rosenstein than to fire bob mueller? is that true? what would happen if trump did it anyway? joins us now is the man who helped write the rules that allowed for the appointment for special counsel like robert mueller. he has a new op-ed "yes, he can fire robert mueller but a normal president would know not to try it." you wrote a couple of points in this op-ed. "many wish for legal restrictions that would block trump from firing mueller but rules can only do so

he wants to fire rod rosenstein and put somebody else in rod rosenstein's place who could then fire mueller because rosenstein is the one with the authority to do it. so the republicans set up a hit job. the president says he wants to sign off on the hit job. the justice department and the intel community says it would be extraordinarily reckless to do so. they say it would shed light on this investigation despite the fact everybody else says that this is misleading as getting information from, oh, i don't know, 1 million russian bots on twitter. congratulations on your story, by the way. that was a great story yesterday. >> yeah, that was incredible. >> but this is such a hand fisted setup to undermine rod rosenstein so they can fire him so he can appoint somebody who can fire mueller. >> it's all about treating the justice department as an extension of the trump tower security force, right? that's how the president views the nation's law enforcement agency. what we have been seeing here for the past few months is an effort to wind up and prepare to disengage from whatever the mueller prob

he really has fired or tried to fire everybody except rosenstein and they have a plan for rosenstein, too. three years ago this week in 2015 justice department, the u.s. attorney's office and southern district of new york made a dramatic announcement. they had arrested a guy who appeared to be a random bank employee, he was picked up by fbi agents at a shopping center in riverdale new york. nobody knew what he was getting arrested for at the time but it turned out according to the indictment and trial and conviction the random bank employee they arrested in 2015 turned out to be a key figure in an active russian spy ring. this was the headline from the press release. attorney general, manhattan u.s. attorney and fbi announced charges against russian spy ring in new york city. attempted to collect economic intelligence and recruit residents as intelligence sources. attorney general eric holder said these charges demonstrate the firm commitment to combatting attempts by agents to illegally gather intel and recruit spies in the united states. we'll use every tool to identify and hold acc

. >> i think rod rosenstein is doing a fine job. >> rod rosenstein was hired after this last election. i think the people at the fbi at the doj need to clean their own house if there are problems. lou: unbelievable, ryan defend ing rosenstein even though it was rosenstein who appointed robert mueller to lead the russia collusion investigation knowing he was close friends with fired fbi director james comey and then rosenstein allowed deputy fbi director andrew mccabe to remain in his post ignoring his many ties to the clintons. perhaps most damaging of all, the left wing new york times says the fisa memorandum will show it was rosenstein who approved a request to extend the surveillance of trump associate carter page, based on information contained in that phony democratically funded trump dossier. my first guest tonight says president trump should walk into the house chamber tonight and hand speaker ryan a letter approving the release of the memorandum right before he begins his state of the union address. joining us tonight congressman matt gates who serves on a number of key commit

how about rosenstein, it is his time in the barrel next? after last night's "new york times" report. all the energy is over the potential to fire mueller. what if it is not mueller he is after. >> listen to members talk about a coop, and criminal activity in the fbi, that will encourage the president to think that he can fire with mueller with impunity, and fire rod rosenstein, put in place someone that will tell bob mueller privately, you cannot look into these issues and follow the money. >> congressman shift, ranking member on this it would be more pernicious than to fire rosenstein, than mueller. what would happen with trump did it anyway? back in 1999, when he worked under deputy attorney general holder, he wrote the rules for special counsel,today, a new op-ed. yes, trump can fire mueller, a normal president would know not to try it. >> privilege to be with you. >> you wrote in this op-ed, a couple of points, i read it. block trump was firing mueller, institutions are what matters, our system depends on separation of power, and charac

first gift, says that congress should use its authority it detain rod rosenstein and ray, if they fail to comply with subpoenas. joining us, can man congressman ron desantos, member of several key committees, a member of freefreedom caucus as well. i must say that new year off to eye quick, and strong start, where do you think we're headed if ray and rosenstein fail to produce these documents? >> happy new year, lou. i think we will go toward contempt. but it is important that type of contempt we pursue. if you remember we hello is lerner -- held lois learner in contempt, we said please prosecute her, guess what, eric holder was not. if we send a referral to justice, they are not going to pursue that against. i think we have to use congress' inherent contempt authority, that was done for 175 years, you have to bring them into congress. and have you a vote on contempt, then you detain them. just like in contempt of court, judge would detain you, and here is what i predict, if they were put in house jail for contempt of technology w congress we woue documents within 24 hours. >> that is

this is deputy attorney general rod rosenstein. he's the one who appointed the special counsel robert mueller. he's the one who mueller reports to at the justice department. rod rosenstein was appointed by president trump. he's a republican. nobody quite knows what to make of him and his inclinations on the russia investigation, which he has steadfastly refused to discuss in public, other than to say that he believes mueller is doing a good job and that he's the right man for the job. but then today, surprise, whole bunch of reporters, including scott wong from "the hill" newspaper were staking out paul ryan's office. they were staking out the peopler of the house, his office today, hoping to catch some news about budget negotiations in congress. they're all outside paul ryan's office when, hey now, here comes, isn't that rod rosenstein? and his security detail? yeah, there's the deputy attorney general filing into house peopler paul ryan's office. what he is doing here? reporters including scott wong were soon able to susz out tha

rod rosenstein comes to mind. i mean, we did a story on friday saying the president would like to have him removed as well. he's grousing about him internally. and perhaps, and this is just speculation, that it came to a certain point where maybe chris wray threw up his hands or chris wray and mccabe threw up their hands and said, all right, this is going to happen. what we don't know is if there was an order for him to leave, where it came from. >> and rachel, it's probably a month or so earlier than we anticipated, but he was under enormous pressure to get out of there. >> yeah, and you just have to look at what happened over the past couple of days. republicans on the hill have sort of been hitting, you know, tv channels talking about these new texts that came to light from two top fbi officials basically suggesting that maybe they weren't going to go hard on then-candidate hillary clinton and the hillary clinton e-mail investigation, because they were worried she was potentially going to be the boss. republica

as though rosenstein's case was the one that the white house was suggesting was the reason for firing comey when donald trump told our own lester holt that it was was of the comey probe. your thoughts? >> it's a great question and certainly we have asked her and we have been trying to get an answer to, far be it from me to question the deputy attorney general. >> if you've got him on hold and you don't have time for him, transfer him to my cell. >> i think the general thinking would be, look, rod rosenstein would say, i wrote this memo because this is what i believbelieve ed and i think there are amount of people who know rod who are inside the justice department saying rod rosenstein really does believe that memo that comey was off the reservation in his handling of the hillary clinton emails and he was repent tent about it in his may testimony before the senate and that we can't have a guy like that and that rod rosenstein believes that and see his role in any sort of shenanigans and firings is not relevant to the investigation, if anything improper happened it wasn't at rod's level

and, rachel, i want to go back to what you were reporting earlier in the show about rod rosenstein going up to the speaker of the house today. this is fascinating. we know very little about it but you framed it as fully as we can understand it. faced a request, subpoena to produce documents basically the full fbi investigation as we know it. >> at least very sensitive parts of it, yeah. >> very much so. they apparently it seems like the fbi director and rod rosen steen going over nunez head to the speaker apparently making case about why they shouldn't comply. >> that's what it seems like from a distance. there's a number of really unusual things about this. number one, we didn't know in advance this was going to happen. our reporting is until that meeting happened the doj really was planning on handing over information in response to that request. which -- we know what he requested. very, very sensitive stuff in the middle of the information and we know that the department of justice didn't then hand that information over after that meeting happened. so again, we don't know what happene

are you concerned, senator, that the memo might target rosenstein? is rosenstein safe in his role? >> that is exactly one of the concerns that we have. that the so-called nunez memo, a four-page memo that threatens extremely classified information and endangers sources could be used against rod rosenstein. it alleged that information was used in the warrant process in the fisa court, a process that then rod rosenstein renewed and perhaps could be used to threaten him. that is very, very troubling because it could be used as a pretext for firing rosenstein, then robert mueller. that kind of chain of events directly threatens the rule of law. >> if the fbi director, khr christopher wray has question, why not speak publicly against the release? >> there were members that spoke directly. stephen who has responibility and a trump appointed, it would be reckless, his words, extraordinarily reckless to release this memo. there are procedures, by the way, to challenge a warrant if incorrect or defective information is used in them. in fact, i helped to write those before the fisa court, th

later learned that the meeting is something that rod rosenstein had asked for. and fbi director chris ray was in that meeting too. then it turned out what they were meeting about was the russia investigation. we can narrow it down even further. the fact of this meeting was a surprise to everybody. what's going on here? speaker of the house is technically most powerful person in whole legislative branch. while all the controversial inquiries have been under way in the house technically under his leadership speaker paul ryan has mostly stayed out of the russia story. here today head of the fbi and de facto attorney general showing up in surprise to everyone. we believe that justice department tonight was poised to hand over to congressional republicans, specifically to devin nunes on the trump transition team, emerged as one of the most aggressive trump partisans in the house. we believe that justice department was poised to hand over to devin nunes documents he demanded from the justice department and fbi that were potentially sensitive about the ongoing robert m

i understand that the president has been aiming his air at rod rosenstein? >> the president has grown frustrated with rod rosenstein, he's airing these frustrations. he's even smopoken about wantin to fire the deputy attorney general rod rosenstein, this sounds like the president airing his frustrations. it gives you an indication about how preoccupied the president is about this russia probe and all these different aftvenues he's taken to try to put an end to it. we know that attorney general jeff sessions recused himself. and how he dealt with mueller in considering firing him and now it seems that rod rosenstein has gotten caught up in that as well and is in the president's crosshairs. >> jeffrey toobin and jonathan turley. regardless how angry the president is at rosenstein, sure he could legally fire him, but what be the political fallout from that? >> i don't think he cares about the political fallout. just pause and think about how many people he's already fired in his own administration. >> and doesn't like already. >> he's talked about firing jeff s

on may 17 rosenstein. he goes on to tweet attacks on rosenstein, comey, mueller, the fbi which he says at one point is in tatters. all of which continues to this day. according to this source familiar to the matter the latest pressure to push comey's replacement. we go back to the time line on june 12, trump friend went on pbs news hour and dropped this bomb shell. >> i think he is considering special counsel. it is clear by one of his lawyers said on television. i think it would be a significant mistake >> we learned the president ordered it only to back down at the last minute. at the very least the president and his people for months have been less than honest about this and including the very moment it has been happening. >> the president has a right to, he has no intention to do so. >> the president is not discussing firing mueller. we are cooperating -- he has not discussed firing bob mueller. >> i haven't given it any thought. i have been reading it from you people. no, i am not dismissing anybody.

rosenstein or any one individual. we are very analytical, very factual, not an emotional document, as we said, we don't accuse, we lay out the facts and he's not identified with any specificity at all. you know, if i could talk about mr. comey's remarks, because i think it kind of ties in here, it is important to note, he talks about small people who are trying to tear down the fbi. that's not what we're trying to do at all. the fbi is full of public servants, we recognize that. but we have to be able to hold some people accountable. if they have done something we think is inappropriate and wrong. that's all we're trying to do here. >> well, look, i don't know who he's talking about specifically when he talks about small people, do you think a small person would, you know, talk about andy mccabe and note that his wife was running an election, things that the president has done, directly criticizing the deputy director for something his wife did. >> it depends, is it relevant? that's the question. is it relevant. is it

are likely to file conten contempt of congress regular this week against deputy attorney general rod rosenstein and fbi director christopher ray because they failed to produce documents related to discredit the trump dossier, today deadline they set to hand over the documents, so far rod rosenstein and ray have not complied, they did meet with speaker ryan on the hill, our special guest tonight, one of the brightest young leaders of republican party, congressman ron desantos, he is demanding answers for american people, and president trump delivering a straight forward counter attack against won of his ormer -- one of his former aides, saying steve bannon lost his mind when bannon attacked president's family, we take with up, shockingly personal attack against the this president with ed rollins. iran's ayatollah decides best response he could conjure to a week of antigovernment protest in iran is how about a pro government rally? state television with video of orchestrated counter demonstration with government employees required to attending. president trump said it could not be clearer that pe

rob r e rosenstein. abc's chief justice correspondent pierre thomas from washington. >> reporter: the president has been accused of demanding loyalty before. has he done it again? this time, with the man in charge of special counsel robert mueller. mueller reports to deputy attorney general rod rosentein, because jeff session recused himself from the russia investigation. and now, a source telling abc news, during a meeting just weeks ago, the president asked rosenstein if he was on his team. and allegedly also wanted to know about the direction of the russia probe. questions that seem to surprise rosenstein. wiithin days of that meeting, rosenstein defended the special counsel in front of the american people. >> have you seen good cause to fire special counsel mueller? >> no. >> reporter: critics say president trump's question to rosenstein, "are you on my team?", is part of a pattern. former fbi director james comey claims the president told him, "i need loyalty. i expect loyalty." >> he asked specific

and rosenstein would say no and rosenstein would be fired and they would work their way down until they found someone willing to actually fire mueller. ala richard nixon saturday night massacre. according to this reporting, that didn't happen because right there in the white house, don mcgahn said no, i won't make the call and i will quit if you insist that i must. but then there is the personal stuff. because after saying i'll quit if you insist, according to this new reporting, don mcgahn basically called the president a chicken. look at that line. mcgahn told white house officials mr. trump would not follow through on the dismissal on his own. and he didn't. he told somebody else to fire mueller. the guy said no, i'm not doing it, and apparently he told other people at the white house, watch, don't worry, he's not going to do it himself. and you know what? the president we know knows how to use a phone. if he did want to fire the special counsel, there is no reason that he couldn't have just called the doj himself, right? at least i think. we can check that out. this is a remarkable

let rosenstein stay. he's also defending the release of nunes releasing this memo under the explanation is transparency. he's not allowing the democratic memo to come out, the minority report to come out. he's basically doing that, allowing the memo to come out knowing the whole point it's not happening in a vacuum being of it's being done to undermine the investigation. >> your thoughts about that, joyce. in terms of prosecution. i do not understand why they find these little problems, somebody having a romance with somebody on e-mail at the fbi involved maybe dumping on all kinds of politicians and they isolate the pro-hillary point of view and get this guy getting his fisa approved to investigate what carter page was doing. at the same time they say carter page had a small part to do with anything in the trump campaign and say any surveillance of him means the whole investigation of the russian operation is somehow tainted. it doesn't make sense. >> it doesn't make any sense at all but there's an old p

there were even reports that rod rosenstein was also feeling pressure. what would you say in response to that concern? >> i would say what i've said probably 100 times before and continue -- we'll see i'm sure a 100 times today that the white house has been fully cooperative and is going to to be fully cooperative. we've gone above and beyond many times and done everything we could. the white house provided over 20 witnesses in tens of thousands of pages of documents to the special counsel. we've done everything we can to be fully transparent and we'll continue to to be that throughout the process. >> what the notion that the president has been applying pressure for months? >> the only thing he's applied pressure to is to make sure we get this revolved so that you guys and every single can focus on the things actually care about. and that is making sure everybody gets the russia fever out of their system once and for fall, that you are all reminded once again there was no collusion, and that we can move forward to focus on things like national security,

christopher wray and rod rosenstein go to see chief of staff john kelly. and they say what to him exactly? >> they say that releasing this memo will be bad for national security. it will be bad for the entire issue of how the government tries to protect classified information. you know, this is a very strange area to be in. where a basically a house committee has just decided that it's going to release classified information. that's not how this normally works. and so the argument they made was classified information will get out, that could, that could set a precedent that would be bad down the road, not just for the facts of this, but for the long term. and frankly, their argument was also that the way the fbi's comment was described here is inaccurate. >> we heard president trump last night after his speech going out and saying to a congressman who was on the aisle, is 00%, i'll release the memo 100%. was that the feeling they got, wray and rosenstein when they visited john kelly? >> yeah. absolutely. one of the oddities of this whole debate is everyone

rod rosenstein is one. we know the president met with both of them the day before he fired jim comey and we presume, explained to both of them his reasoning for doing so. i think other people who are close to the president at the time, reince priebus, jared kushner, steve bannon, anyone who would have heard the president explain why it was he was firing jim comey and especially, any dissatisfaction with comey's handling of the russia investigation, especially if he ever said i want that investigation stopped. anyone in the white house who would have witnessed the president and can talk to his state of mind at the time he made those decisions would be a key witness for director mueller. >> do we still have barbara mcquade with us? sounds like no. matt, i will ask you this question. if you were putting together an argument in order to corroborate james comey's memos, who would you be interviewing? how would you be doing that? >> i would want to talk to all the people who worked for jim comey, who we know he s

what we're told is that on monday, the head of the fbi and deputy attorney general rod rosenstein went to the white house to meet with chief of staff john kelly, to try to urge him to come around to their position which is that this memo that has been such a fierce subject of debate on the hill should not be made public. their argument is that this do damage to national security and it's essentially an inaccurate attack on the fbi. >> has anyone you've spoken to addressed the fact that when two officials of this standing and rank make the trip to the white house to beg the white house not to release this, what then happens to one or both of these officials if it is released nonetheless? >> well, i think, look, boat the fbi and the doj, the buildings haven't moved but there is a greater distance between those two buildings and the white house than there's been in some time because of this russia investigation issue. and you know, they're asking and i think my sense from the folks i'm talking to is they know this is a high mountain and they probably won't get there. there's a lot of conc

he's skeptical of rosenstein. rosenstein was not part of the campaign, not someone close to him. he can't believe there are republicans from baltimore. this has been a long-standing issue and the president has deep, deep concerns about mueller and if mueller were to go he'd need someone in rosenstein's spot who would do it for him. >> michael, you've been around for a long time as an investigative reporter, and i will ask robert costa and carroll lee about this, are we reaching critical mass of our institutions? it feels different in the last 48 hours. i want to share with everyone james comey's tweet when he referred to, of course, andrew mccabe leaving early. special agent mccabe stood tall over the last eight months when small people were trying to tear down an institution we all depend on. this followed by sally yates who was acting ag, deputy ag and removed as well. she writes on twitter, despite relentless attacks on our democratic institutions and norms, our resilience has kept our country strong. but we will remain so only if we strive to live up to the american values th