Kevin Johnson

USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee has no plans to recall Attorney General Jeff Sessions to testify about his failure to disclose contacts with the Russian ambassador to the United States during the former Alabama senator's January confirmation hearing.

Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley said Friday that he will accept a written clarification of Sessions' testimony, despite mounting calls from Democrats for the attorney general to explain under oath why he did not acknowledge two separate meetings last year with Russian envoy Sergey Kislyak.

Public disclosures of those meetings earlier this week prompted Sessions to recuse himself Thursday from overseeing the ongoing FBI investigation into Moscow's attempts to intervene in the U.S. elections. Federal investigators also are reviewing communications between associates of President Trump and Russian government officials.

"Attorney General Sessions did the right thing by recusing himself,'' Grassley said. "It’s unfortunate that the Democrats didn’t even have the decency to give him an opportunity to clear up confusion to the statement in writing.”

In his January testimony, Sessions told Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., that he had no communications with Russian government officials. He provided a similar response in writing to Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., as part of the confirmation process.

Sessions, facing a wave of criticism following the disclosure of the meetings, some of it coming from members of his own party, said Thursday that he did not intend to mislead the committee. He said the meetings with the Russian envoy were taken in his capacity as a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee and not as a campaign surrogate for then-candidate Donald Trump.

At the time of the meetings, the FBI was deep into its investigation of Russian intervention into the U.S. elections.

"My answer was honest and correct as I understood it,'' Sessions said.

Justice spokesman Peter Carr said Sessions would provide the Senate Judiciary Committee with the attorney general's amended testimony Monday.

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Democrats, including Sens. Leahy, Tim Kaine of Virginia and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, have all demanded that the attorney general return to the committee.

"He must appear in public before the Senate Judiciary Committee to explain why he twice gave misleading testimony under oath and why he failed to disclose such false testimony until prompted by news reports,'' Leahy said. "Such conduct is unacceptable from our nation’s top law enforcement official.''

Kaine went further, saying that if Sessions refuses to return to the committee, "I will call for his resignation.''

Late Friday, California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the Judiciary Committee's ranking Democrat, also called on the Justice Department's inspector general to review Sessions' recusal decision and his communications with the White House and government ethics officials during his deliberations prior to recusal.

"Attorney General Sessions said that his decision followed the recommendation of (Justice) ethics officials, though he has not explained why he failed to to come forward and correct his sworn testimony before reports of his contacts with the Russian ambassador became public,'' Feinstein said in a letter to Inspector General Michael Horowitz. The letter was co-signed by four other committee Democrats.

Next week, the same committee will consider the nomination of Maryland U.S. Attorney Rod Rosenstein, Trump's pick to serve as Sessions' top deputy, who would inherit oversight of the Russia probe.

Until his confirmation is resolved, the inquiry is being managed by acting Deputy Attorney General Dana Boente, a former Virginia U.S. attorney appointed by President Barack Obama. Boente was thrust into the national spotlight last month when Trump abruptly fired acting Attorney General Sally Yates, an Obama administration holdover, when she directed Justice lawyers not to defend the president's controversial executive order, suspending travel from seven majority Muslim countries.

In a Thursday night interview on Fox News, Sessions further described his meetings with Kislyak as benign contacts that had nothing to do with the then-senator's influential role in the Trump presidential campaign.

He characterized the recent firestorm resulting from those meetings as "hyped beyond reason.''

Since his confirmation as attorney general early last month, Sessions has been guarded in his public comments about the Russian inquiry, to the point of declining to acknowledge the investigation.

Yet when asked in the Fox News interview whether he believed the Russian government's efforts during the election favored Trump's candidacy — a conclusion reached by U.S. intelligence officials — Sessions' response appeared to depart from the U.S. position.

"I have never been told that,'' he said.