Fox News "The Story" - Transcript: Rep. Jordan: Trump Will Be Looking for a New Attorney General

Interview

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MACCALLUM: Here now Republican Congressman Jim Jordan of Ohio, a member of the House judiciary committee. Congressman, good to see you tonight. Thank you for being here.

REP. JIM JORDAN, R-OHIO: Good to be with you, Martha.

MACCALLUM: Your reaction. You've been very critical of the attorney general.

JORDAN: Well--

MACCALLUM: And I think the attorney general feels like people don't spend in a time focusing on the work that they are doing.

JORDAN: I mean, it's obvious to me, I think obvious to most people that Rod Rosenstein is in charge of the Justice Department, not Jeff Sessions, and I think it's also obvious that the president is going to be looking for a new attorney general. I think he's made that pretty clear.

My guess is that will happen sometime in the not-so-distant future. Jeff Sessions is a good man, he was a good senator, but I think it's the president of the United States wants an attorney general that I think conduct matters different than Jeff Sessions, and I think that will happen sometime in, like I said, in the not-too-distant future.

MACCALLUM: And you've been very critical of Rod Rosenstein, as well. And you've been trying to get the DOJ through him to turn over a lot of documents. The president appears at least for now to have he's off the hook. Are you OK with that?

JORDAN: No, I'm not OK with that. We've ask for in subpoenaed the McCabe memos, we haven't received those. We asked for the August 2nd memo of 2017 where Rod Rosenstein altered the scope of special counsel Mueller's investigation. He won't let us see that. We've asked for the FISA application, portions of it, he won't let us see that. And we've asked for Bruce Ohr's 302's, and he won't let us see those.

And on top of all that, he was a no-show last week when he was asked to come in and give us answers under oath and now today, a key player in this whole affair Glenn Simpson took the fifth. So no, I have as big a beef with Rod Rosenstein as I do with Jeff Sessions because Rod Rosenstein is the one who is making it difficult for us to do our job as a separate and equal branch of government.

MACCALLUM: All right. Here's Rod Rosenstein's attorney disagrees with you, which I'm sure doesn't come as a big surprise.

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JORDAN: Imagine that, yes. Imagine that.

MACCALLUM: -- as his job to alleviate talking about you guys. Watch.

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MACCALLUM: That's Glenn Simpson's attorney version of this, Jim Jordan.

JORDAN: Look, Glenn Simpson took the fifth today. You take the fifth if you believe you have some criminal liability, some concern there. That's the only reason you take the fifth. Glenn Simpson did that. I think that's why he did that, because of he's doing it just to obstruct a congress investigation, that's wrong too. So I think he did it because he's concerned about criminal liability.

And to say we're the problem? Remember what happened here, Martha. The Clinton campaign paid Perkins Coie law firm who hired Glenn Simpson who then went out and hired a foreigner Christopher Steele and a wife of a top Justice Department official Nellie Ohr to produce the dossier that they then funneled to Bruce Ohr who gave it to the FBI, who then went to the secret court so they could get a warrant to spy on President Trump's campaign.

And they are accusing us of wrongdoing for trying to get answers to how that all -- how that all took place? That is just ridiculous. In fact, he took the fifth because he's concerned about criminal liability he faces.

And I think John (Ph) said just a couple days ago and said it well, because he said one thing to one committee, and we have another witness to testify in front of our committee, the judiciary committee, who said exactly the opposite. I think that's what he most likely took the fifth today.

MACCALLUM: All right. Nellie Ohr, the wife of Bruce Ohr is up on Friday. So we'll see what she says. Good to see you tonight, congressman. Thank you very much for being here.

JORDAN: You bet.

MACCALLUM: You bet.

JORDAN: Thanks, Martha.

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