During a confirmation hearing for deputy and associate attorney general nominees on Tuesday, Sens. Al Franken (D-MN) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA) engaged in a contentious back-and-forth over Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ previous testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Sessions announced last week that he was recusing himself from any potential DOJ investigations involving the Trump campaign, after it was revealed that he twice met with the Russian ambassador to the U.S. before the election. While responding to a question from Franken in his January confirmation hearing, Sessions had said he’d never had any contacts with Russian officials.
Franken said Tuesday that he was unsatisfied with Sessions’ follow-up to the committee insisting that he fully answered the Minnesota senator’s question. Franken contested that assessment and called for the attorney general to return to testify.
Grassley, the chair of the committee, jumped in to accuse Franken of asking Sessions a “gotcha question.”
“It was not a gotcha question, sir,” Franken replied.
Franken returned to the issue later in the hearing and argued that it’s not fair to characterize his question to Sessions as a “gotcha” question. Franken noted that he did not even ask Sessions about his own contacts with Russian officials, but actually asked if he was aware of evidence that other Trump associates were in communications with Russia.
“It can’t be a gotcha question if he didn’t answer the question,” he said.
Watch the exchange below:
This post has been updated.
