AP Photo Sessions' media attack just for Trump

JOSH GERSTEIN with a REALITY CHECK -- “Sessions’ broad attack on leaks aimed at an audience of one: Trump”: “Dozens of reporters and a horde of photographers turned out for Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ news conference Friday to announce a crackdown on leaks, but the most important target for his message wasn’t in the room: President Donald Trump. Sessions’ eight-minute broadside against leaks and his stern warning to leakers seemed to be aimed at trying to repair his badly frayed relationship with Trump, who has expressed regret for selecting Sessions and who has specifically complained that he was doing too little to fight the tidal wave of leaks that have swamped the Trump White House. ...

“Friday’s event at Justice Department headquarters was carefully structured to ensure that Sessions’ message reached Trump with the fewest distractions possible. If reporters had the chance to question the attorney general about the Russia investigation, he might have demurred because he has recused from the probe. But with the recusal at the core of Trump’s complaints about Sessions, any televised scene of the attorney general broaching the subject could send the president into a blue rage. So, Sessions filed out after he spoke. Cameras were then shut off at Justice officials’ insistence before Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein returned to take reporters’ questions about the nitty-gritty of the leak crackdown.” http://politi.co/2wuqqys


-- “Leak Investigations Triple Under Trump, Sessions Says,” by NYT’s Charlie Savage and Eileen Sullivan: “[T]he Justice Department is pursuing about three times as many leak investigations as were open at the end of the Obama era, a significant devotion of resources to hunt down disclosures that have plagued the Trump administration.” http://nyti.ms/2utCMpc

-- @chucktodd: “If DoJ media source threat is real (I assume it’s not; just a show presser to please WH) then I look forward to ignoring that subpoena”.