Former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates rebuked President Trump on Saturday for talking about who he thinks the Justice Department should be investigating.
“DOJ not a tool for POTUS to use to go after his enemies and protect his friends. Respect rule of law and DOJ professionals. This must stop,” Yates, who was fired by Trump in January, said in a tweet.
DOJ not a tool for POTUS to use to go after his enemies and protect his friends. Respect rule of law and DOJ professionals. This must stop.
— Sally Yates (@SallyQYates) November 4, 2017
Yates’ tweet comes one day after she testified in a closed session before the House Intelligence Committee, which is conducting an investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Trump told reporters on Friday, before his extended trip to Asia, that the Justice Department should be looking into the “dishonesty” of the Democrats.
“I like to let it run itself,” Trump said of the department. “Honestly, they should be looking at the Democrats. They should be looking at [former Clinton campaign chairman John] Podesta, and all of that dishonesty. They should be looking at a lot of things. A lot of people are disappointed in the Justice Department, including me.”
He further explained his frustrations in a string of tweets Friday morning.
“Everybody is asking why the Justice Department (and FBI) isn’t looking into all of the dishonesty going on with Crooked Hillary & the Dems. New Donna [Brazile] book said she paid for and stole the Dem Primary. What about the deleted E-Mails, Uranium, Podesta, the Server, plus, plus,” he said. “People are angry. At some point the Justice Department and the FBI must do what is right and proper. The American people deserves it!”
Trump’s comments about how the DOJ should be investigating Democrats have elicited backlash from people in his own party. Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., who has been a vocal critic of Trump’s, called those remarks “totally inappropriate.”
The Justice Department under the Trump administration is run by Attorney General Jeff Sessions, whom Trump has criticized in the past. In July, Trump said he wouldn’t have picked Sessions had he known Sessions would recuse himself from Russia-related inquiries which are looking into the Trump campaign’s ties to the Russians.
Trump said the move was “very unfair to the president.”
