WASHINGTON — Attorney General Jeff Sessions, publicly skewered by President Trump for stepping clear of the Russia-Trump investigations, said Thursday he plans to stay in his job.
Sessions said that he has had the ‘‘honor of serving as attorney general’’ and that he plans ‘‘to continue to do so as long as that is appropriate.’’ Asked whether he could keep running the Justice Department given Trump’s comments, he responded: ‘‘I'm totally confident that we can continue to run this office in an effective way.’’
But the public expression of confidence masked deeper tensions regarding his position in the administration and his rapport with a president who once turned to him as a confidant and policy guide.
Since his decision in March to recuse himself from the investigation into Russian meddling in last year’s presidential election, Sessions has rapidly lost his standing as one of Trump’s most trusted advisers and has drifted from the president’s inner circle, according to two White House officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to be candid.
Trump has frequently cited Sessions’ recusal to aides in private as one of the reasons he thinks his administration is under siege on Russia matters and has vented to friends that Sessions’ decision has left him vulnerable, the officials said.
In recent weeks, such complaints have not abated as the White House has dealt with near-daily twists regarding Russia. Trump has turned to new legal advisers on those developments rather than his longtime ally Sessions, who was the first senator to endorse him at a time when few in the Republican establishment supported the candidate, people close to Sessions and Trump say.
Although Sessions and his deputies are in close touch with some Trump advisers on issues of law enforcement, they are no longer driving the president’s thinking or highly influential with Trump as he navigates the controversies and plots out his agenda.
The attorney general speaks less regularly with the president, these people say, and instead has buried himself in his work at the Justice Department putting in place some of the policies Trump touted on the campaign trail, in essence remaining an ally but not a confidant.
Deputy White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said that although the president was ‘‘disappointed’’ in Sessions’ decision to recuse himself, ‘‘clearly he has confidence in him or he would not be the attorney general.’’
There was minimal communication between the White House and the Justice Department following Sessions’ statement Thursday that he would not resign, according to people in the administration. Justice Department officials said they were not surprised to hear the president’s criticism of Sessions, because they have been aware for months of Trump’s anger about the recusal.
Sessions, who served as a prosecutor before his career in the Senate, described the attorney general’s job Thursday as ‘‘something that goes beyond any thought I would have ever had for myself,’’ and showed no sign of being ready or willing to resign from his job.
A Justice Department news conference Thursday took on a surreal quality with Sessions announcing a major case busting a shadowy online marketplace that became a hub for drug trafficking. It should have been a triumphant moment for the Justice Department in its effort to crack down on crime and narcotics, a top priority of the president. Instead, Sessions faced reporters questioning how he could continue serving as attorney general.
‘‘We’re serving right now,’’ he said. ‘‘The work we’re doing today is the kind of work that we intend to continue.’’
On Wednesday, The New York Times published highlights from an interview with Trump in which the president suggested that he regretted nominating Sessions.
‘‘Sessions should have never recused himself, and if he was going to recuse himself, he should have told me before he took the job, and I would have picked somebody else,’’ Trump said, according to the Times.
Sessions’ recusal came after The Washington Post reported that he had met with Russia’s ambassador to the United States and had not disclosed the contacts at his confirmation hearing. When Sessions announced the recusal, he cited his involvement with the Trump campaign.
Trump said Sessions’ recusal was unfair to him as president.
‘‘How do you take a job and then recuse yourself?’’ he said. ‘‘If he would have recused himself before the job, I would have said, ‘Thanks, Jeff, but I’m not going to take you.’ It’s extremely unfair — and that’s a mild word — to the president.’’
In the attorney general role, Sessions has proved to be one of Trump’s most loyal foot soldiers, methodically enacting policies the president supports on criminal justice.
When Sessions directed federal prosecutors nationwide in April to make immigration cases a higher priority, for example, he declared in no uncertain terms, ‘‘This is the Trump era.’’
With the Russia scandal enveloping the White House, Sessions has forged ahead with his agenda aimed at empowering law enforcement and putting more criminals behind bars.
One of Sessions’ most significant changes has been to reverse an Obama-era policy aimed at altering how prosecutors treat nonviolent drug offenders, part of an effort to end mass incarceration. Sessions, instead, has instructed lawyers to pursue ‘‘the most serious, readily provable offense,’’ including charges that carry mandatory minimum sentences.
