WASHINGTON — Rod J. Rosenstein, the deputy attorney general, said on Sunday that the Justice Department was not pursuing reporters as part of its growing number of leak investigations, just two days after he and other department officials had appeared to signal a harsher line toward journalists.
“We don’t prosecute journalists for doing their jobs,” Mr. Rosenstein said on “Fox News Sunday.” “That’s not our goal here.”
He had declined to answer such a question on Friday, telling reporters who asked whether the department would prosecute reporters that he would not “comment on any hypotheticals.”
Mr. Rosenstein’s appearance on Fox came two days after administration officials heralded a new and stiffer posture on government leaks, with Attorney General Jeff Sessions telling reporters that leak investigations had tripled under the Trump administration.
