President Trump delayed a scheduled meeting with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein today after speculation earlier this week the DOJ official would be fired.
"The President spoke with Rod Rosenstein a few minutes ago and they plan to meet next week. They do not want to do anything to interfere with the hearing," White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders released in a statement Thursday.
The meeting comes after the New York Times reported Rosenstein talked about invoking the 25th amendment and wearing a wire during meetings with President Trump during a meeting in 2017. Some in the room at the time say he was being sarcastic and pushing back on requests from fired FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe to aggressively investigate President Trump.
During a press conference at the United Nations General Assembly Wednesday evening, President Trump said he would prefer to keep Rosenstein.
"I would much prefer keeping Rod Rosenstein. He said he did not say it. He said he does not believe that. He said he has a lot of respect for me, and he was very nice and we’ll see.”Trump added, “My preference would be to keep him and to let him finish up,” Trump said. "I may call Rod tonight or tomorrow and ask for a little bit of a delay to the meeting, because I don’t want to do anything that gets in the way of this very important Supreme Court pick."
Meanwhile, House Republicans want to see Rosenstein under oath on Capitol Hill to explain the comments.
Rep. @jim_jordan calls on Rosenstein to testify before Judiciary Committee https://t.co/i6ijddvk5V pic.twitter.com/rkaCFVUNxN
— FOX Business (@FoxBusiness) September 26, 2018