CNN’s Don Lemon asks if Rosenstein is a ‘double agent type’

CNN anchor Don Lemon on Monday questioned whether outgoing Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is a “double agent,” pointing to the content of Rosenstein’s resignation letter. 

Lemon asked fellow CNN host Chris Cuomo his thoughts on Rosenstein, arguing that the 30-year Justice Department veteran’s resignation letter served as “a big wet kiss” to the president.

{mosads}”To give a big wet kiss to the president, if he read the whole letter, putting in superfluous things he didn’t have to say, that’s all fine and dandy,”  Lemon said Monday night.

Rosenstein submitted his letter of resignation to Trump on Monday evening, stating that he will officially leave the Justice Department on May 11.

Despite being a frequent target of the president’s ire, Rosenstein was complimentary in his letter to Trump, thanking him for “the courtesy and humor you often display in our personal conversations” in addition to “the opportunity to serve.”

Lemon noted that throughout Rosenstein’s tenure as deputy attorney general, he has been on both the president’s “good” and “bad” sides and said he’s been “partisan” at times with regard to special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation and reports about his own firing.

Cuomo said that Rosenstein, who appointed Mueller as special counsel to investigate alleged ties between the Trump campaign and Russia, appears to be “talking … more about the media” in his resignation letter.

Rosenstein appeared to take a jab at the media’s coverage of the Mueller probe in his resignation letter, stating that his agency enforces the law “without fear or favor” while ignoring “fleeting distractions” because “a republic that endures is not governed by the news cycle.” 

“I’ve been wanting to ask you this. There have been reports about him, right?” Lemon asked Cuomo. “Do you think [Rosenstein is] a double agent type?”

Cuomo responded by describing the outgoing official as an “enigma.”

“I don’t know what to make of him. I say enigma. I don’t get it,” Cuomo said. “They brought him to be an ax on [former FBI Director James] Comey, then he picks Mueller, [saying] you needed an outside source to process this because the president’s actions were so shady.

“Then he winds up taking the decision from Mueller and winds up in this letter talking about the news isn’t what matters. It’s, you know, our job.”