WASHINGTON -- President Donald Trump declined to say Tuesday if he has confidence in Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, escalating pressure on the Justice Department as his White House negotiated rare access to classified documents for his congressional allies.
Asked before a private meeting with the president of South Korea if he has confidence in Rosenstein, who is overseeing the special counsel's Russia investigation, he asked reporters to move on to another question.
"Excuse me, I have the president of South Korea here," Trump said. "He doesn't want to hear these questions, if you don't mind."
The comments came just before White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders announced that a meeting to allow House Republicans to review highly classified information on the Russia probe will happen Thursday.
Sanders said FBI Director Christopher Wray, National Intelligence Director Dan Coats and Justice Department official Edward O'Callaghan will meet with House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif., and House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Trey Gowdy, R-S.C.
Nunes, an ardent Trump supporter, has been demanding information on an FBI source in the Russia investigation, according to the Justice Department. And Trump has taken up the cause as the White House tries to combat the threat posed by special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into potential ties between Russia and the Trump campaign.
Trump said Tuesday that it would be a "disgrace" to the country if it's shown that the FBI had spies in his campaign, and that would "make probably every political event ever look like small potatoes."
Later Tuesday, Trump tweeted, "The spy was there early in the campaign and yet never reported Collusion with Russia, because there was no Collusion."
In a tweet Sunday, Trump demanded that the Justice Department investigate whether the FBI infiltrated his presidential campaign and "if any such demands or requests were made by people within the Obama Administration!"
Trump's demand alarmed some observers, who said they felt that it not only violated presidential protocol but also could have a chilling effect on federal law enforcement or its use of informants.
In response to Trump's tweet, the Justice Department said it would expand an open, internal investigation into the ongoing Russia probe by examining whether there was any politically motivated surveillance. The White House then said Monday that Trump Chief of Staff John Kelly would organize the meeting to review the documents.
But Sanders said no White House staff members -- including Kelly -- will be present at Thursday's meeting, despite calls from lawmakers for the briefing to be bipartisan.
The top Democrat on the House intelligence panel, Rep. Adam Schiff of California, said the briefing should have been done through the bipartisan "Gang of 8," which includes Republican and Democratic leaders and the top Republicans and Democrats on the House and Senate intelligence panels. That group regularly receives classified briefings.
Trump made his demand amid days of public venting about the special counsel investigation, which he has called a "witch hunt" that he says has yielded no evidence of collusion between his campaign and Russia.
In response, the Justice Department moved to defuse the confrontation by asking its watchdog to investigate whether there was inappropriate surveillance.
"If anyone did infiltrate or surveil participants in a presidential campaign for inappropriate purposes, we need to know about it and take appropriate action," Rosenstein said in a statement announcing the move.
The Justice Department had originally rejected the request from Nunes, saying his request for information "regarding a specific individual" could have severe consequences, including potential loss of human life.
The department said then that the White House had signed off on its letter, but Nunes wasn't satisfied and continued to pressure Justice Department officials.
The New York Times was the first to report that the FBI had an informant who met several times with Trump campaign officials who had suspicious contacts linked to Russia.
The Justice Department's internal probe began in March at the request of Attorney General Jeff Sessions and congressional Republicans. Sessions and the lawmakers urged Inspector General Michael Horowitz to review whether FBI and Justice Department officials abused their surveillance powers by using information compiled by Christopher Steele, a former British spy, and paid for by Democrats to justify monitoring Carter Page, a former campaign adviser to Trump.
Horowitz said his office will look at those claims as well as communications between Steele, and Justice and FBI officials.
COHEN PARTNER
The Times, meanwhile, reported Tuesday that a business partner of Michael Cohen, Trump's personal lawyer, has quietly agreed to cooperate with the government as a potential witness.
Under the agreement, the partner, Evgeny Freidman, a Russian immigrant who is known as the Taxi King, will avoid jail time and will assist government prosecutors in state or federal investigations, according to a person briefed on the matter.
Cohen's conduct was initially examined by Mueller and then referred to the U.S. attorney's office in Manhattan. Last month, federal agents carried out search warrants at Cohen's home, his office and a hotel room where he was staying, seeking documents related to his business associates and accountants.
Trump's lawyers have been resigned to the likelihood that the investigation of Cohen's businesses could lead him to cooperate with federal prosecutors. That likelihood could become greater with a business partner of Cohen's cooperating with law enforcement.
Freidman has been Cohen's partner in the taxi business for years, managing cabs for him even after New York City regulators barred Freidman last year from continuing to manage medallions.
Freidman, who was disbarred earlier this month, had been accused of failing to pay more than $5 million in taxes and faced four counts of criminal tax fraud and one of grand larceny -- all Class B felonies. Each carries a maximum prison sentence of up to 25 years in prison.
Instead, he appeared in court in Albany on Tuesday and pleaded guilty to a single count of evading only $50,000 worth of taxes. He faces five years of probation if he fulfills the terms of his agreement, the judge, Patrick Lynch of Albany County court, said during the roughly 20-minute proceeding.
Information for this article was contributed by Desmond Butler, Chad Day, Mary Clare Jalonick, Jill Colvin, Eric Tucker, Darlene Superville and Jonathan Lemire of The Associated Press; and by Danny Hakim, William K. Rashbaum and Vivian Wang of The New York Times.
A Section on 05/23/2018