WASHINGTON 鈥� Days after The New York Times reported that Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein floated using a wire to record President Trump and broached invoking the 25th Amendment last year, a longtime friend of the deputy attorney general tells 草莓传媒 that the accusations are 鈥渁bsurd.鈥�
鈥淭he idea that Rod Rosenstein would be seriously considering using the 25th Amendment to disqualify a sitting president is just laughable,鈥� said Jim Trusty, a former Department of Justice official who has known and worked with Rosenstein for 18 years. 鈥淚 mean this is a guy who鈥檚 a constitutional scholar, a longtime prosecutor, a very intelligent person; and the notion that he would be sitting around a table, planning this coup saying: 鈥榳e’re going to enlist other people to get the president knocked out of office鈥� is just crazy.鈥�
The 25th Amendment allows for the vice president and a majority of officials to declare the president unfit and remove him or her from office. Talk of invoking the amendment has been swirling around the presidency, documented most notably in The New York Times anonymous op-ed and Bob Woodward鈥檚 book, Fear.
But Trusty says the amendment is intended for reasons like incapacity from medical issues, such as when former President Ronald Reagan underwent surgery after being shot. And Trusty says Rosenstein knows this.
鈥淚t鈥檚 not about just getting rid of a president because you don鈥檛 like his politics or his behavior or his words,鈥� Trusty said. 鈥淪o the idea that it’s being floated to The New York Times that he was a party to something like that is just absurd.鈥�
While the article describes the atmosphere of the Justice Department days after FBI Director James Comey鈥檚 firing, Trusty believes the report is telling of something much more.
鈥淥ne reaction was to laugh at the absurdity of it because I just don’t believe it for a minute; but then the other reaction was to think about how seriously someone is out to get him,鈥� Trusty said. 鈥淚 mean that’s a pretty sharp knife to try to put in his back.鈥�
Sources in The New York Times article describe Rosenstein鈥檚 behavior as erratic and emotional after Comey鈥檚 firing. Rosenstein disputed the Times’ account, calling it 鈥渋naccurate and factually incorrect.鈥�
And, from Trusty鈥檚 experience, that鈥檚 not how he knows Rosenstein to be, either.
鈥淭his is a guy who takes ethics very seriously and doesn鈥檛 stray,鈥� Trusty said. 鈥淗e goes about it in a very mature, kind of calm fashion.鈥�
Talking specifically about the allegations around Rosenstein鈥檚 emotional state, Trusty says: 鈥淭hat was just ludicrous to me. There’s no way that happened.鈥�
Trusty says while Rosenstein has a sense of humor, he doesn鈥檛 believe Rosenstein would joke about something as serious as the 25th amendment.
鈥淚t鈥檚 like the movie 鈥楢wakenings鈥� 鈥� when he cracks a joke, you kind of can鈥檛 believe it鈥檚 happening,鈥� Trusty said. 鈥�…But there鈥檚 absolutely no way he said anything that鈥檚 remotely promoting of that aspect 鈥� promoting of the idea that the president is incapacitated under the constitution and that they could pursue this kind of bloodless coup against him.鈥�
Trusty has known Rosenstein as a 鈥減retty serious character鈥� and a 鈥渂utton-down, by-the-book guy,鈥� and he doesn鈥檛 see Rosenstein straying from that.
鈥淔rom the beginning, Rod has always proven to have incredible serious prosecutorial ethics and I don’t think that’s changed,鈥� Trusty said. 鈥淗e’s got a much wider hot spotlight than ever, but he’s the same guy I’ve known for 18 years and he takes his responsibilities very seriously.鈥�
草莓传媒’s Kate Ryan contributed to this report.聽
