Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein‘s was grilled during a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Thursday over the findings from Inspector General Michael Horowitz regarding bias within the FBI and Department of Justice.

Congressman Ron DeSantis (R-FL) began his questioning by asking Rosenstein about Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, the notorious FBI operatives who conversed about stopping Donald Trump from becoming president. Since these messages were not found in the original collection of Strzok and Page’s communication records, DeSantis peppered Rosentein with questions on whether this development – combined with previous findings – undermines Strzok’s integrity.

As Rosenstein noted Strzok’s comments were” highly inappropriate,” DeSantis said it was “more than that” before moving on to ask whether the FBI or DOJ spied on Trump’s 2016 investigation. When they eventually reached the subject of Robert Mueller, DeSantis stated that the Russia special counsel is not the Mueller investigation, “its really the Rosenstein investigation.”

“You’re supervising Mueller and its supposedly about collusion between Trump’s campaign with Russia and obstruction of justice, but you wrote the memo saying [James] Comey should be fired, and you signed the FISA extension for Carter Page. My question to you is, it seems like you should be recused from this more so than Jeff Sessions because you were involved in making decisions affecting both prongs of this investigation. Why haven’t you done that?”

Rosenstein said he’d be willing to recuse himself if it were appropriate, but DeSantis continued to ask him why the Mueller probe is still investigation potential obstruction of justice in light of everything from the IG report.

Watch Rosentstein’s answer above, via Fox News.

[Image via screengrab]

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