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New Justice official is now in an intense political glare

Rod Rosenstein is deputy attorney general.J. Scott Applewhite/associated Press

WASHINGTON — In the center of the controversy engulfing the upper echelons of the Justice Department, there’s a little-known, Harvard-educated lawyer whose name is suddenly on everyone’s lips: Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein.

Rosenstein was the man FBI Director James Comey spoke with recently when he needed more resources for his investigation into possible ties between President Trump’s campaign staff and Russia, according to press reports. Rosenstein was the veteran prosecutor who, along with Attorney General Jeff Sessions, met with Trump on Monday to discuss Comey’s imminent dismissal. And it was Rosenstein who penned the scathing three-page memo about the FBI director’s performance that Trump used on Tuesday to publicly justify firing Comey.

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The 52-year old former federal prosecutor from Maryland is now, after helping engineer Comey’s removal, the most prominent law enforcement official helping to oversee the Russia probe. Sessions, who was a Trump campaign adviser and had contacts with Russian officials of his own, recused himself in January.

How Rosenstein handles himself over the next few weeks will play an important role in determining whether public faith is restored in the ability of the Department of Justice to investigate, or whether the country will edge further, as some Democrats have suggested, toward a constitutional crisis.

Rosenstein, reached on his cellphone Wednesday morning, declined to discuss his memo or the dismissal of Comey. “I’m not going to talk about that,” said Rosenstein. “Are you surprised by that?”

The longtime prosecutor has a reputation as a straight shooter. He sailed through the Senate confirmation process as the No. 2 Justice Department official less than three weeks ago on a 94-to-6 vote. But now some of his allies are having second thoughts because of the role he played in Comey’s dismissal. At least one senator, Democrat Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, wants him to testify under oath about his involvement.

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“I’ve known Rod Rosenstein a long time. I’ve always thought well of him. I was cheered by his nomination,” Benjamin Wittes, a senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution, said on his Twitter feed. “I misjudged him completely.” (Wittes, through a spokeswoman, declined to comment further.)

Longtime allies say that Rosenstein should be given the benefit of the doubt — at least for now.

“He is committed to the pursuit of justice,” said Gregg Bernstein, a former state’s attorney in Maryland who has known Rosenstein for 15 years.

“You’ve got to see how this plays out. Who’s going to be the next FBI director? Is a special prosecutor going to be appointed?” Bernstein said. “I know Rod will continue to investigate. And he’ll go wherever the facts lead.”

He believes Rosenstein would resign before covering up wrong-doing. “If it comes down to a Nixonian scenario, I believe he will do the right thing,” added Bernstein, who is a Democrat.

Rosenstein is no stranger to controversy: He once worked for independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr and helped to investigate the Whitewater land deal that dogged the Clinton presidency.

George W. Bush appointed him to be the US attorney for Maryland in 2005. He came into that job when the office was in disarray after his predecessor, Thomas M. DiBiagio, was forced out. Rosenstein quickly started making a name for himself with big cases that led to complicated criminal convictions.

“Rod came in and professionalized it,” said former Maryland attorney general Douglas Gansler, a Democrat who had known Rosenstein for a decade.

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“I’ve seen him make the right call,” Gansler added. “I’ve seen him take gang cases that hadn’t been taken by the federal government before. Instead of doing the quick hit and getting the arrest, he’d get to the root of it.”

He was so well respected even in deep blue Maryland that he stayed on during Barack Obama’s tenure, Gansler said.

But Gansler paused when asked how to square the Rosenstein he knows with the fact that he signed a memo outlining a case for firing Comey.

“I don’t know what his role was,” Gansler said. “He’s doing his job as deputy attorney general. . . . I don’t for a moment believe he made the decision to fire Comey. It’s too important of a decision. It could undermine the very fabric of this administration.”

During Rosenstein’s confirmation hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee, he refused to promise that he would appoint a special prosecutor for the Russia probe. He added that he was “not aware” of any conflict that would prevent him from overseeing the investigation.

He was approved by the committee on a 19-to-1 vote. But the bipartisan support is fraying.

Democrats on Wednesday seized on media reports that Comey asked Rosenstein for additional resources for his Russia investigation shortly before Comey was dismissed.

Warren, who was one of only six senators to vote against Rosenstein’s appointment when it came to the Senate floor, said Wednesday in a CNN interview that he should “testify under oath” about “exactly what it was that Director Comey asked last week” when he reportedly wanted more manpower for the Russia investigation.

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In a separate interview with he Globe, Warren slammed the memo Rosenstein wrote about dismissing Comey, calling it “shocking.”

“It reads like a press release, not a measured explanation of why someone has been fired,” Warren said. “It’s a deeply political document. It’s totally outside the context of what the Department of Justice should do.”

Rosenstein’s memo recited criticism of Comey’s investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private e-mail server from seven former Department of Justice officials, a list that included five who served under Republican administrations and two who served Democrats.

The letter included a quote from Donald Ayers, the former deputy attorney general for then-President George H.W. Bush. But in an interview with BuzzFeed News on Wednesday, Ayers said the rationale for firing Comey was “a sham.”

Rosenstein’s memo did not include a specific recommendation to remove Comey from office but does lay out the rationale that the Trump administration used to fire him.

“The FBI’s reputation and credibility have suffered substantial damage, and it has affected the entire Department of Justice,” Rosenstein wrote in the memo. “That is deeply troubling to many department employees and veterans, legislators and citizens.”

“The way the director handled the conclusion of the e-mail investigation was wrong,” he wrote. “As a result the FBI is unlikely to regain public and congressional trust until it has a director who understands the gravity of the mistakes and pledges never to repeat them.”

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Annie Linskey can be reached at annie.linskey@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @annielinskey.