--- title: Jeff Sessions Russia: Read a Transcript of Paul Ryan Remarks description: Speaker Paul Ryan said that Attorney General Jeff Sessions should only recuse himself if "he himself" is the subject of the investigation. canonical: https://time.com/4688923/jeff-sessions-russia-paul-ryan-transcript/ author: TIME article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-03-02T18:04:38.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T03:38:07.716Z article:section: Politics og:title: Read a Transcript of Paul Ryan's Remarks on Jeff Sessions og:description: "Should he recuse himself?" og:url: https://time.com/4688923/jeff-sessions-russia-paul-ryan-transcript/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blteab2a06e1f5fd642/6988bcb78fd2ee4fea356018/jeff-sessions-russia-controversy.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 4846 og:image:height: 2726 og:image:alt: Jeff Sessions Addresses African American History Month Observation At Justice og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Read a Transcript of Paul Ryan's Remarks on Jeff Sessions twitter:description: "Should he recuse himself?" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blteab2a06e1f5fd642/6988bcb78fd2ee4fea356018/jeff-sessions-russia-controversy.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Read a Transcript of Paul Ryan's Press Conference on Jeff Sessions > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. by [Ryan Teague Beckwith](https://time.com/author/ryan-teague-beckwith/) ## Ryan Teague Beckwith Mar 2, 2017 6:04 PM UTC  U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions delivers remarks at the Justice Department's 2017 African American History Month Observation at the Department of Justice on Feb. 28, 2017. U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions delivers remarks at the Justice Department's 2017 African American History Month Observation at the Department of Justice on Feb. 28, 2017.Zach Gibson—Getty Images by [Ryan Teague Beckwith](https://time.com/author/ryan-teague-beckwith/) ## Ryan Teague Beckwith Mar 2, 2017 6:04 PM UTC House Speaker Paul Ryan said that Attorney General Jeff Sessions should only recuse himself from investigations into Russia if “he himself” is the subject of the investigation. Speaking at a brief press conference on Capitol Hill, the Wisconsin Republican said he “hadn’t read” the transcripts of what Sessions told the Senate Judiciary Committee at his confirmation hearing about whether he met with Russia and could not speak to whether it was accurate. “Should he recuse himself?” he said. “I think he answered that question this morning, which is if he himself is the subject of an investigation, of course he would. But if he’s not, I don’t see any purpose or reason to doing this.” Read a complete transcript of Ryan’s remarks. --- > “” --- ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4688923/jeff-sessions-russia-paul-ryan-transcript/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4688923/jeff-sessions-russia-paul-ryan-transcript/"},"headline":"Read a Transcript of Paul Ryan's Press Conference on Jeff Sessions","datePublished":"2017-03-02T18:04:38.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T03:38:07.716Z","description":"Speaker Paul Ryan said that Attorney General Jeff Sessions should only recuse himself if \"he himself\" is the subject of the investigation.","url":"https://time.com/4688923/jeff-sessions-russia-paul-ryan-transcript/","keywords":["Jeff Sessions","russia","Congress","Paul Ryan","justice","transcripts"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blteab2a06e1f5fd642/6988bcb78fd2ee4fea356018/jeff-sessions-russia-controversy.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Ryan Teague Beckwith","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/ryan-teague-beckwith/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blteab2a06e1f5fd642/6988bcb78fd2ee4fea356018/jeff-sessions-russia-controversy.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Jeff Sessions Addresses African American History Month Observation At Justice","caption":"U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions delivers remarks at the Justice Department's 2017 African American History Month Observation at the Department of Justice on Feb. 28, 2017 in Washington, D.C.","creditText":"Zach Gibson—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/jeff-sessions/","name":"Jeff Sessions"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4688923/jeff-sessions-russia-paul-ryan-transcript/","name":"Read a Transcript of Paul Ryan's Press Conference on Jeff Sessions"}}]}] ```