McCabe, Rosenstein, & Individual-1

The former acting F.B.I. director, Andrew G. McCabe, wrote a confidential memo last spring recounting a conversation that offered significant behind-the-scenes details on the firing of Mr. McCabe’s predecessor, James B. Comey, according to several people familiar with the discussion.

[...]

Mr. McCabe has turned over his memo to the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III.

In the document, whose contents have not been previously reported, Mr. McCabe described a conversation at the Justice Department with the deputy attorney general, Rod J. Rosenstein, in the chaotic days last May after Mr. Comey’s abrupt firing.

[...]

Mr. Rosenstein [...] said the president had originally asked him to reference Russia in his memo, the people familiar with the conversation said. Mr. Rosenstein did not elaborate on what Mr. Trump had wanted him to say.

To Mr. McCabe, that seemed like possible evidence that Mr. Comey’s firing was actually related to the F.B.I.’s investigation into the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia, and that Mr. Rosenstein helped provide a cover story by writing about the Clinton investigation.

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After their meeting, Mr. Rosenstein gave Mr. McCabe a copy of a draft firing letter that Mr. Trump had written, according to two people familiar with the conversation. Mr. McCabe later gave that letter, and his memos, to Mr. Mueller.

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In conversations with prosecutors, Mr. Trump’s lawyers have cited Mr. Rosenstein’s involvement in the firing of Mr. Comey as proof that it was not an effort to obstruct justice, according to people familiar with the president’s legal strategy.

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Mr. McCabe’s memo, one of several that he wrote, highlights the conflicting roles that Mr. Rosenstein plays in the case. He supervises the special counsel investigation and has told colleagues that protecting it is among his highest priorities. But many current and former law enforcement officials are suspicious of some of his other actions, including allowing some of Mr. Trump’s congressional allies to view crucial documents from the investigation.

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McCabe’s memo reflects the F.B.I.’s early efforts to discern Mr. Trump’s intentions in firing Mr. Comey, an effort that continues today. Mr. Trump and his advisers have issued conflicting and changing explanations for the termination.

At first, they pointed to Mr. Rosenstein’s reasoning, which criticized Mr. Comey’s handling of the Clinton investigation.

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But Mr. Trump quickly undercut that statement, telling NBC News that he had planned to fire Mr. Comey even before receiving Mr. Rosenstein’s memo. “And in fact, when I decided to just do it, I said to myself, I said, ‘You know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story,’” Mr. Trump said.

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Mr. Trump also told Russian diplomats in the Oval Office that firing Mr. Comey had relieved “great pressure” that he had faced because of Russia.

  NYT

That's right. I had forgotten that.

Mr. McCabe’s memo reflects the anxiety of the early months of the Trump administration and presaged a relationship with law enforcement that has only grown more strained.

Both Comey and McCabe were wise enough to make and keep memos. I'm guessing the whole of the FBI is.

Most recently, Mr. Trump has publicly demanded that the Justice Department investigate the Russia investigation itself.

In response, Mr. Rosenstein has walked a perilous line. Faced with threats on his job, he told Republicans in Congress that he would not be “extorted.” But he has also relented to pressure in some instances, providing information to Congress that would not normally be shared amid an investigation.

I can't say I've ever been a fan of Mr. Rosenstein, allowing for some uncertainty about his character, actions and intentions, but I have a feeling I'm not going to become any more of a fan as more evidence comes out. I appreciate the fact that he appointed Robert Mueller, but I appreciate even more that the situation wasn't such that Rosenstein might have been a special prosecutor. I don't think he has the integrity for it.  Or the cold nerve.

Mr. Rosenstein has said little about his strategy for dealing with the political crosswinds. But he has defended his memo about Mr. Comey. “I wrote it. I believe it. I stand by it,” he said in a statement last year. He added that it was never intended to “justify a for-cause termination.”

Of course it was. That's why Trump asked him for it. He knew what it was being used for.

 From a September 1, 2017, article at the time of the draft letter Rosenstein turned over to Mueller:

The special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, has obtained a letter drafted by President Trump and a top political aide that offered an unvarnished view of Mr. Trump’s thinking in the days before the president fired the F.B.I. director, James B. Comey.

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The letter, drafted in May, was met with opposition from Donald F. McGahn II, the White House counsel, who believed that its angry, meandering tone was problematic, according to interviews with a dozen administration officials and others briefed on the matter. Among Mr. McGahn’s concerns were references to private conversations the president had with Mr. Comey, including times when the F.B.I. director told Mr. Trump he was not under investigation in the F.B.I.’s continuing Russia inquiry.

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Mr. McGahn’s concerns about Mr. Trump’s letter show how much he realized that the president’s rationale for firing Mr. Comey might not hold up to scrutiny, and how he and other administration officials sought to build a more defensible public case for his ouster. [...]

Mr. McGahn successfully blocked the president from sending the letter — which Mr. Trump had composed with Stephen Miller. [...] But a copy was given to the deputy attorney general, Rod J. Rosenstein, who then drafted his own letter. Mr. Rosenstein’s letter was ultimately used as the Trump administration’s public rationale for Mr. Comey’s firing, which was that Mr. Comey had mishandled the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private email server.

  NYT

Where is Don McGahn these days?  In an FBI safe house awaiting his time to testify in court?

McCabe's 60 Minutes interview