Rod Rosenstein

Rod Jay Rosenstein (born January 13, 1965) is an American attorney who served as the 37th United States deputy attorney general from April 2017 until May 2019.

Prior to his appointment, he served as a United States attorney for the District of Maryland.

Rosenstein was born in 1965 to an Ashkenazi Jewish family in Philadelphia.

His father, Robert, ran a small business, whilst his mother, Gerri Rosenstein, was a bookkeeper and local school board president.

Rod grew up in Lower Moreland Township, Pennsylvania.

Rosenstein graduated from Lower Moreland High School.

He has one sister, Dr. Nancy Messonnier, who directed the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, during the COVID-19 epidemic until March 14, 2021 when her resignation became effective.

Rosenstein attended the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, where he graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa in 1986 with a Bachelor of Science in economics.

After graduating from Penn, Rosenstein attended Harvard Law School where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review.

Rosenstein graduated from Harvard in 1989 with a Juris Doctor degree, cum laude.

He then served as a law clerk to Judge Douglas H. Ginsburg of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

From 1990 to 1993, he prosecuted public corruption cases as a trial attorney with the Public Integrity Section of the Criminal Division, the latter of which was led by then Assistant Attorney General Robert Mueller.

During the Clinton Administration, Rosenstein served as counsel to Deputy Attorney General Philip B. Heymann (1993–1994) and Special Assistant to Criminal Division Assistant Attorney General Jo Ann Harris (1994–1995).

Rosenstein then worked in the United States Office of the Independent Counsel under Ken Starr on the Whitewater investigation into President Bill Clinton.

As an Associate Independent Counsel from 1995 to 1997, he was co-counsel in the trial of three defendants who were convicted of fraud, and he supervised the investigation that found no basis for criminal prosecution of White House officials who had obtained FBI background reports.

He was a Wasserstein Fellow at Harvard Law School from 1997–98.

After his clerkship, Rosenstein joined the United States Department of Justice through the Attorney General's Honors Program.

United States Attorney Lynne A. Battaglia hired Rosenstein as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of Maryland in 1997.

From 2001 to 2005, Rosenstein served as Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Tax Division of the United States Department of Justice.

He coordinated the tax enforcement activities of the Tax Division, the U.S. Attorneys' Offices and the IRS, and he supervised 90 attorneys and 30 support employees.

He oversaw civil litigation and served as the acting head of the Tax Division when Assistant Attorney General Eileen J. O'Connor was unavailable, and he personally briefed and argued civil appeals in several federal appellate courts.

President George W. Bush nominated Rosenstein to serve as the United States Attorney for the District of Maryland on May 23, 2005.

He took office on July 12, 2005, after the U.S. Senate unanimously confirmed his nomination.

He was the only U.S. Attorney retained by President Barack Obama.

As United States Attorney, he oversaw federal civil and criminal litigation, assisted with federal law enforcement strategies in Maryland, and presented cases in the U.S. District Court and in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.

Rosenstein had also been nominated to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in 2007, but his nomination was never considered by the U.S. Senate.

In 2012, Attorney General Eric Holder directed Rosenstein to investigate leaks regarding the U.S.'s Stuxnet operation, which sabotaged Iran's nuclear program; as a result of the investigation, former U.S. Marine Corps General James Cartwright pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI and acknowledged leaking information about the operation to New York Times journalist David E. Sanger.

During his tenure as U.S. Attorney, Rosenstein successfully prosecuted leaks of classified information, corruption, murders and burglaries, and was "particularly effective taking on corruption within police departments."

At the time of his confirmation as deputy attorney general in April 2017, he was the longest-serving U.S. attorney.

President Donald Trump nominated Rosenstein to serve as Deputy Attorney General on February 1, 2017.

Rosenstein was confirmed by the U.S. Senate on April 25, 2017.

In May 2017, at Trump's behest, he authored a memo that Trump then cited as the basis for his decision to dismiss FBI Director James Comey.

In May 2018, Rosenstein reportedly told the five U.S. Attorneys in districts along the border with Mexico that, where refugees were concerned, they should not "be categorically declining immigration prosecutions of adults in family units because of the age of a child."

The directive, issued as part of the Trump administration family separation policy, led to the separation of thousands of small children from their parents, many of whom were seeking asylum in the United States after fleeing violence in Central America.

Following the recusal of Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Comey's dismissal, Rosenstein appointed Robert Mueller as special counsel to investigate the myriad links between Trump associates and Russian officials and spies and related matters.

Rosenstein previously assumed authority over the parallel FBI probe after Sessions recused himself over misleading remarks he made to the Senate Committee on the Judiciary during his confirmation process.

The New York Times reported Rosenstein prevented the FBI and Mueller from investigating Trump's personal and financial dealings in Russia.

On November 7, 2018, Trump transferred this oversight to acting US Attorney General Matthew Whitaker.

Rosenstein submitted his resignation as deputy attorney general on April 29, 2019, which took effect on May 11, 2019.

Rosenstein joined the law firm King & Spalding's D.C. office as a partner on the "Special Matters and Government Investigations" team in January 2020.