Pompeo To Rosenstein: ‘If You Can’t Be On The Team, Maybe You’ve Got Something Else To Do’
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo suggested Sunday that Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein should “find something else to do” if he “can’t be on the team,” The Hill reports.
Pompeo’s — some would say unusually stark — remarks come just days after a bombshell report from The New York Times which alleges that Rod Rosenstein suggested invoking the 25th amendment, and argued that President Donald Trump should be secretly taped.
According to the report, Rosenstein made these suggestions in the spring of 2017 — after President Trump fired James Comey from his post as FBI director — further damaging the fragile relationship between the White House and the intelligence community.
Immediately after the report’s publication, Rosenstein denied the allegations. Shortly thereafter, Deputy Managing Editor for The New York Times — Matt Purdy — hit back at Rosenstein, stating that Rosenstein should not “comfort” himself just because he “doesn’t like the facts.”
The Department of Justice suggested that Rosenstein made the remarks casually and sarcastically, but Purdy said that the Department’s “claim that Rosenstein was sarcastic when he suggested he wear a wire on Trump is not supported by our reporting or others.”
For Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, however, the situation appears to be crystal clear, and so does his message: Get with the program, or leave.
Those who do not support Donald Trump’s agenda should not get in the way, Pompeo signaled.
“I’ve been pretty clear since my beginning of service here in this administration. If you can’t be on the team, if you’re not supporting this mission, maybe you’ve got something else to do.”
The administration, Pompeo added, needs everyone “engaged” in Trump’s mission. The secretary of state has, he said, carried this message to his colleagues in the CIA — and to his FBI and DOJ colleagues as well.
“If you’re not [engaged], you should take this time to do something more productive,” Pompeo concluded.
President Donald Trump has not addressed this latest revelation related to Rosenstein as yet. The president has, however, frequently and vocally expressed his distaste and dislike for the old guard of the FBI, and for entrenched establishment figures within the Department of Justice.
Most recently, as the Inquisitr reported, President Trump vowed to “get rid of the stench” in the FBI, prompting the FBI Agents Association, a group representing thousands of current and former FBI agents, to defend the bureau via Twitter.
Pompeo’s nearly martial messaging echoes that made by a former aide to the Trump administration, Steve Bannon.
“Shut up and get with the program,” is what former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon told the Koch brothers, after the influential donors vowed to combat Trump’s protectionism, according to Politico.
Much like Bannon’s earlier point, Pompeo’s message is clear and concise — The Trump administration will no longer tolerate internal resistance.
