Trump, Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein to meet over Russia probe

US President Donald Trump and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who oversees the special counsel investigation into Russia’s alleged meddling in the 2016 US presidential election, will meet on Thursday to discuss Rosenstein’s future amid uncertainty about the fate of the second-highest-ranking official in the Justice Department.

The White House announced the meeting on Monday after a flurry of conflicting reports about whether Rosenstein, a frequent target of Trump’s anger, would be leaving the post.

“At the request of Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, he and President Trump had an extended conversation to discuss the recent news stories,” White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said on Twitter.

She said the meeting will be on Thursday because Trump was at the UN General Assembly on Monday and has meetings with world leaders later in the week.

There has been widespread speculation since Friday that Trump would fire Rosenstein after a report in The New York Times said that in 2017, Rosenstein had suggested secretly recording the president and recruiting Cabinet members to invoke a constitutional amendment to remove him from office.

Rosenstein denied the Times report as “inaccurate and factually incorrect.”

Shortly after the Times story, Trump told supporters at a rally in the state of Missouri that there is “a lingering stench” at the Justice Department and that “we’re going to get rid of that, too.”

A person familiar with the matter told Reuters on Monday that Rosenstein has not resigned and is still serving as US deputy attorney general.

The person confirmed that the topic of resigning did come up in discussions with White House Chief of Staff John Kelly over the weekend, but said the Axios report that Rosenstein had officially resigned was incorrect.

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The deputy attorney general also proposed wearing a wire to secretly tape conversations with President Trump, according to The New York Times.

The Rosenstein furor, launched by unconfirmed reports that he had verbally resigned, underscored the mounting tension in the White House over the investigation by US Special Counsel Robert Mueller into Russia’s alleged interference in the presidential election.

Rosenstein has defended Mueller and been a target of Trump since he assumed supervision of the Russia investigation after his boss, Attorney General Jeff Sessions, recused himself because of his own contacts with Russia’s ambassador to Washington while serving as a Trump election campaign adviser became public.

Rosenstein’s departure would prompt questions about the future of Mueller’s investigation and whether Trump, who has called the Russia probe a “witch hunt,” would seek to remove Mueller.

The furor comes just six weeks ahead of the November 6 congressional elections, and Rosenstein’s removal could become an explosive political issue as Trump’s fellow Republicans try to keep control of Congress.

Congressional Republicans, Democrats and some Trump aides have warned for months that the president should not fire Rosenstein.

The reports about Rosenstein add to the turmoil roiling the administration. In addition to dealing with the Mueller investigation, the White House is also struggling to win confirmation of its Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh, in the wake of sexual misconduct allegations.

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