Rosenstein to Sit for Interview With 2 House Panels Next Week

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein will sit for a closed-door interview next Wednesday with the top Republicans and Democrats from two House committees.

The interview is to be conducted as Rosenstein has come under fire from a group of House Republicans who want him questioned about whether he sought to undermine President Donald Trump.

Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte and Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy — along with the top Democrats from those same committees, Jerrold Nadler and Elijah Cummings — announced Thursday night that they will conduct the interview.

Rosenstein will answer questions under oath, and that the interview will be transcribed by a court reporter and later made public, according to a statement released by the committees.

"The transcript will then be reviewed by the Intelligence Community to avoid the public dissemination of classified or otherwise protected information. Once cleared, the transcript will be publicly available," the committees said in the statement.

A major topic is expected to be a New York Times report last month that Rosenstein suggested secretly recording Trump and raised the possibility of invoking a constitutional provision that allows the cabinet to remove the president. Rosenstein has denied the report.

Lawmakers who have been conducting an examination of investigative decisions made during the 2016 election by the FBI and the Justice Department have been calling on Goddlatte to subpoena Rosenstein, and force him to answer questions.

Republican Representative Mark Meadows, chairman of the conservative House Freedom Caucus Chairman and a close Trump ally, said Thursday that Rosenstein hasn’t cooperated with Congress or been transparent about his conduct and "should resign immediately."

Rosenstein supervises Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into connections between Trump’s 2016 presidential election and Russian efforts to interfere with the results, and Democrats have characterized the GOP attacks on him as part of a concerted effort to undermine the probe.