Sessions, a former Republican U.S. senator and an early supporter of Trump's presidential campaign, is expected to be asked to explain why he told senators in January that he had no dealings with Russian officials previous year while serving as an adviser to candidate Trump.
Earlier this week, a month after Trump fired Comey, a close associate of Trump said the president was considering firing Mueller as well, though he was installed by the Justice Department to conduct the Russian Federation investigation only a few weeks ago. Investigators have also been looking for any evidence of possible financial crimes among Trump associates, officials said.
Trump had received private assurances from former FBI Director James Comey starting in January that he was not personally under investigation. In the short letter Trump sent to Comey dismissing him from the FBI, he had thanked Comey for informing him that he was not under investigation.
Specifically, they write, "five people briefed" say that Mueller's team will soon interview Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and National Security Agency Director Mike Rogers, along with Rogers's former deputy, who recently left the government.
Sessions, a close campaign adviser to Trump and the first senator to endorse him, stepped aside from the investigation in early March after acknowledging he had spoken twice in the months before the election with the Russian ambassador.
The officials said Coats, Rogers and Ledgett would appear voluntarily, though it remains unclear whether they will describe in full their conversations with Trump and other top officials, or will be directed by the White House to invoke executive privilege. He said he and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein had long discussed their concerns with Comey's job performance. After a day of speculation, White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said, "While the president has the right to, he has no intention to do so".
But don't forget, according to Comey's own testimony, Trump also said he would be happy to see the investigation go forward even if some "satellite" associates of his were shown to have done something wrong. Comey said he found it concerning that Trump would ask him to drop the agency's probe of Flynn and declined to state publicly that Trump himself was not under investigation, in part because it would create a "duty to correct" if that changed. And, like Trump, Sessions didn't exactly criticize Comey's handling of the Hillary Clinton email investigation during the presidential campaign.
Trump Appears to Confirm He Is Under Investigation
When Comey came forward saying he was reopening the investigation in October of a year ago , Sessions praised him. The committee leaders said in a statement that they "look forward to future engagements" with Mr Mueller.
Sessions testified about his dealings with Russian officials and whether he intentionally misled Congress as the Senate Intelligence Committee probes the Russia matter.
But if questions coming into Tuesday's hearing were, "How would Sessions respond to fired FBI Director James Comey's intimation that there was something else - something classified - about Sessions to be concerned about?" or "What more do we know about President Trump's role in firing Comey or putting pressure on officials to drop the Russian Federation investigation?" there wasn't much light shed on them. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) whether Sessions "lingered" because he knew he wasn't supposed to leave Comey alone with Trump, Sessions ducked: "What I did recall is I did depart", Sessions said, "and Director Comey was sitting in front of the president's desk and they were talking".
Comey said he believed Mueller would look into Trump for obstruction of justice.
Why was Comey fired, exactly?
Reports that Trump was considering firing Mueller surfaced last week, again citing unnamed sources.
A spokesman for Representative Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the House committee, said Mueller will meet with members of the panel this week or next.
Be smart: Sessions was never the "satellite" Trump insiders fret most.
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