Trump team weighs options for replacing AG Jeff Sessions
25 July 2017 10:51 PM IST
President Trump and his advisers are privately discussing the possibility of replacing Attorney General Jeff Sessions, and some confidants are floating prospects who could take his place were he to resign or be fired, according to people familiar with the talks. Members of Trump's circle, including White House officials, have increasingly raised the question among themselves in recent days as the president has continued to vent his frustration with the attorney general, the people said.
Replacing Sessions is viewed by some Trump associates as potentially being part of a strategy to fire special counsel Robert S Mueller III and end his investigation of whether the Trump campaign coordinated with the Kremlin to influence the 2016 election, according to the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly.
On Tuesday, Trump renewed his attack on Sessions, accusing him on Twitter of taking a "VERY weak position" on alleged "crimes" by Hillary Clinton and intelligence leakers.
The president had taken another swipe at Sessions on Monday, calling his attorney general "our beleaguered A.G." and asking why Sessions was not "looking into Crooked Hillary's crimes & Russia relations?" Both points are notable. Sessions was once considered one of Trump's closest advisers and enjoyed access few others had. Now he is left to endure regular public criticism by his boss. Trump's suggestion, too, that his top law enforcement official investigate a former political rival is astounding, and even his allies have said in the pastthat such a move would be unheard of in the United States. Trump, after the election, had backed away from the idea of possibly prosecuting Hillary Clinton.
Sessions's tight relationship with Trump and the White House has unraveled since he recused himself in March from the Russia probe.
The president had privately complained about that decision for weeks, and in an interview with the New York Times last week he said he would not have appointed Sessions as attorney general had he known that Sessions would do such a thing.
After Sessions recused himself, he passed on the responsibility to Deputy Attorney General Rod J Rosenstein, who then appointed Mueller as special counsel overseeing the Russia investigation . Trump could order Rosenstein and then Associate Attorney General Rachel Brand to fire Mueller.
If they quit instead of doing so, he could appoint an acting attorney general who would. Trump could also appoint an acting attorney general with them in place effectively passing over Rosenstein and Brand and order that person to remove the special counsel.
The Justice Department has issued opinions in the past saying that such a move isand isn't permissible. And his pick for an acting attorney general would have to have Senate confirmation and be serving elsewhere in the government or have worked in the Justice Department for 90 days within the past 365 and be at a certain senior pay level.
Among the names being floated as possible Sessions replacements are Sen. Ted Cruz and former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, according to people familiar with the conversations.
Giuliani dismissed a report mentioning his name as a possible attorney general and told CNN that Sessions "made the right decision under the rules of the Justice Department" to recuse himself.
He did not return a message seeking comment. Some Trump advisers said that this process could be agonizing for the attorney general, with the president's anger flaring but no decision being reached for weeks or maybe months, leaving Sessions isolated from the White House. But not all in Trump's orbit share the view that Sessions's days are numbered.
Meanwhile, Sessions' allies say President Trump is carrying out a deliberate public campaign to pressure him to quit, rather than fire him outright, but the country's top lawyer has no intention of resigning.
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