Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein called the pushback to Attorney General William Barr's actions surrounding the Russia report "bizarre," saying in a new interview that Barr is doing all he can to follow the law and make as much of the report public as possible.
"He's being as forthcoming as he can, and so this notion that he's trying to mislead people, I think is just completely bizarre," Rosenstein told The Wall Street Journal.
"It would be one thing if you put out a letter and said, 'I'm not going to give you the report.' What he said is, 'Look, it's going to take a while to process the report. In the meantime, people really want to know what's in it. I'm going to give you the top-line conclusions.' That's all he was trying to do."
Rosenstein was referring to Barr's four-page summary of special counsel Robert Mueller's report on Russian interference in the 2016 election. Mueller concluded that neither President Donald Trump nor his campaign conspired with the Russians to defeat Hillary Clinton. He could not say whether or not Trump obstructed justice, however, but Barr wrote in his summary he and Rosenstein decided there was not sufficient evidence to pursue an obstruction charge.
Democrats are demanding to see Mueller's full report, but Barr said it must be redacted to conceal classified and privileged information.
Rosenstein told the Journal the American public should have "tremendous confidence" in Barr's efforts on the report.
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