{"id":31255,"date":"2018-01-30T13:12:46","date_gmt":"2018-01-30T21:12:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=31255"},"modified":"2018-01-30T21:29:00","modified_gmt":"2018-01-31T05:29:00","slug":"republicans-take-aim-at-rob-rosenstein","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2018\/01\/30\/republicans-take-aim-at-rob-rosenstein\/","title":{"rendered":"Republicans Take Aim at Rod Rosenstein"},"content":{"rendered":"

One by one, senior officials from the FBI and the DOJ have been disappearing, victims of the Republican onslaught of attacks designed to obstruct justice and stop the investigation into the Republican conspiracy to enlist Russia’s help to enable Donald Trump to infest the White House.\u00a0 Rod Rosenstein is the last official needed to maintain the Mueller investigation, and Republicans are taking aim at him.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"0130Rosenstein\"<\/p>\n

A secret, highly contentious Republican memo reveals that Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein approved an application to extend surveillance of a former Trump campaign associate shortly after taking office last spring, according to three people familiar with it.<\/p>\n

The renewal shows that the Justice Department under President Trump saw reason to believe that the associate, Carter Page, was acting as a Russian agent. But the reference to Mr. Rosenstein\u2019s actions in the memo \u2014 a much-disputed document that paints the investigation into Russian election meddling as tainted from the start \u2014 indicates that Republicans may be moving to seize on his role as they seek to undermine the inquiry<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The memo\u2019s primary contention is that F.B.I. and Justice Department officials failed to adequately explain to an intelligence court judge in initially seeking a warrant for surveillance of Mr. Page that they were relying in part on research by an investigator, Christopher Steele, that had been financed by the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton\u2019s presidential campaign… [emphasis added<\/em>]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Inserted from <NY Times<\/a>><\/span><\/p>\n

The Republican memo, sight unseen, is a bold faced lie.\u00a0 Carter Page was under FISA surveillance as a Russian agent long before there was any investigation into Trump, and the FISA warrant had been renewed several times at 90 day intervals.\u00a0 All Rosenstein did was to apply for another pro forma 90 day extension.\u00a0 Also, the research by Christopher Steele was initially financed by a Republican PAC.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

Rachel Maddow<\/a> broke this down in so much detail, that she spent 28 minutes doing it.<\/span><\/p>\n