Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.) urged President Donald Trump not to fire Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who has come under fire after a report alleging that Rosenstein suggested secretly recording President Trump in the White House and discussed recruiting cabinet members to possibly invoke the 25th Amendment to remove the President from office.
“I don’t think he should fire Rosenstein, I think there has been enough disruption,” Smith told Bold TV. “I think Rosenstein should be allowed to continue to do his job, and if President Trump were to fire Rosenstein, everyone would assume it was an effort to undermine the Mueller investigation and that’s the biggest problem here. The President from the very beginning should’ve said ‘Look, I’ve seen the evidence from the intel community Russia interfered let’s have a fair investigation.”
Smith, who serves as the ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, said his House colleagues should avoid continuing to support special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation if it “drags on past a certain point.”
“You know, if Mueller hasn’t given us the report, we have to decide to go forward or not I think after this election, once we get into December depending on who is in the majority, then it might be appropriate to say ‘Ok where gonna give him till March or April,'” Smith said. “But right now I think we’re optimistic that by the end of the year this investigation will be wrapped up.”
Lisa Hagen from The Hill newspaper reported that “A majority of American don’t want President Trump to oust Rod Rosenstein, according to a Harvard CAPS/Harris poll released exclusively to The Hill on Monday, as the two are expected to meet on the deputy attorney general’s fate.”
Smith urged his congressional colleagues to hold their firepower on any impeachment proceedings until there was “clear and convincing evidence” of a serious offense.
“We have to have clear and convincing evidence to proceed here whatever anyone thinks about President Trump, and certainly I’m no fan, impeachment is an enormous step,” Smith said. “We have to be sure of the evidence in front us, it can’t just be because we don’t like President Trump It can’t be because we don’t like the way he speaks it can’t be because we don’t like his policies it has to be because we have clear evidence of crimes and misdemeanors that rise to the level of an impeachable offense.”
Carrie Sheffield is the founder of Bold. She is passionate about storytelling to empower and connect others. A founding POLITICO reporter, Carrie contributed on political economy at Forbes and wrote editorials for The Washington Times. After earning a master’s in public policy from Harvard University, she managed credit risk at Goldman Sachs and researched for Edward Conard, Bain Capital founding partner and American Enterprise Institute scholar. She earned a B.A. in communications at Brigham Young University and completed a Fulbright fellowship in Berlin.
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