House GOP members led by Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows (NC) have filed formal articles of impeachment against Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, according to a late Wednesday announcement by Meadows over Twitter.
I just filed a resolution with @Jim_Jordan and several colleagues to impeach Rod Rosenstein. The DOJ has continued to hide information from Congress and repeatedly obstructed oversight–even defying multiple Congressional subpoenas.
We have had enough.
— Mark Meadows (@RepMarkMeadows) July 25, 2018
News of the resolution comes after weeks of frustration by Congressional investigators, who have repeatedly accused Rosenstein and the DOJ of “slow walking” documents related to their investigations. Lawmakers say they’ve been given the runaround – while Rosenstein and the rest of the DOJ have maintained that handing over vital documents would compromise ongoing investigations.
Not even last week’s heavily redacted release of the FBI’s FISA surveillance application on former Trump campaign Carter Page was enough to dissuade the GOP lawmakers from their efforts to impeach Rosenstein. In fact, its release may have sealed Rosenstein’s fate after it was revealed that the FISA application and subsequent renewals – at least one of which Rosenstein signed off on, relied heavily on the salacious and largely unproven Steele dossier.
In late June, Rosenstein along with FBI Director Christopher Wray clashed with House Republicans during a fiery hearing over an internal DOJ report criticizing the FBI’s handling of the Hillary Clinton email investigation by special agents who harbored extreme animus towards Donald Trump while expressing support for Clinton. Republicans on the panel grilled a defiant Rosenstein on the Trump-Russia investigation which has yet to prove any collusion between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin.
“This country is being hurt by it. We are being divided,” Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) said of Mueller’s investigation. “Whatever you got,” Gowdy added, “Finish it the hell up because this country is being torn apart.”
Rosenstein pushed back – dodging responsibility for decisions made by subordinates while claiming that Mueller was moving “as expeditiously as possible,” and insisting that he was “not trying to hide anything.”
“We are not in contempt of this Congress, and we are not going to be in contempt of this Congress,” Rosenstein told lawmakers.
Congressional GOP were not impressed.
“For over eight months, they have had the opportunity to choose transparency. But they’ve instead chosen to withhold information and impede any effort of Congress to conduct oversight,” said Representative Mark Meadows of North Carolina, a sponsor of Thursday’s House resolution who raised the possibility of impeachment this week. “If Rod Rosenstein and the Department of Justice have nothing to hide, they certainly haven’t acted like it.” –New York Times (6/28/18)
And now, Rosenstein’s fate is in the hands of Congress.
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