Senate confirms deputy transportation secretary to replace Rosenstein
WASHINGTON – The Senate Thursday afternoon confirmed Deputy Transportation Secretary Jeffrey A. Rosen as Deputy Attorney General.
The nomination was approved 52-45.
All Republicans voted yes. All Democrats voted no.
Rosen, 61, is a former corporate lawyer and a former general counsel for the Department of Transportation. He has occupied the No. 2 spot at Transportation since May 2017.
Rosen will now assume the office Rod Rosenstein vacated last week.
Rosenstein’s two-year tenure was marked by his role overseeing Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Rosenstein was given that task in the spring of 2017 after then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from the investigation.
On April 18, the Department of Justice released a redacted version of Mueller’s report on the investigation. A day later, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) issued a subpoena for the full report.
Last week the committee voted to hold Attorney General William Barr in contempt for his refusal to comply with the subpoena. The resolution is expected to come to the House floor before Congress adjourns for the one-week Memorial Day recess, which begins at the end of next week.
Rosen intimated to Senate Judiciary Committee during his confirmation hearing last month that he would not support the release of the full report.
“If I’m confirmed, I would be the deputy attorney general, and I would be working with the attorney general,” he said.
The report said Mueller did not find any evidence of collusion between members of the Trump campaign and Russian officials. Mueller did not make a determination as to whether obstruction of justice had occurred.
This article is republished with permission from TMN
Bryan is an award-winning political journalist who has extensive experience covering Congress and Maryland state government.
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Bryan has broken stories involving athletic and sexual assault scandals with the Baltimore Post-Examiner.
His original UMBC investigation gained international attention, was featured in People Magazine and he was interviewed by ABC’s “Good Morning America” and local radio stations. Bryan broke subsequent stories documenting UMBC’s omission of a sexual assault on their daily crime log and a federal investigation related to the university’s handling of an alleged sexual assault.