Jen Psaki said Biden would not try to influence the DOJ like Trump did, in a cutting response to a Fox News question

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  • Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, criticized Trump in a cutting response to a question.

  • Psaki referred to Trump's repeated attempts to interfere with Justice Department investigations.

  • "We do something new here ... and allow the Justice Department to act independently," she said.

  • See more stories on Insider's business page.

Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, said in response to a question from the Fox News anchor Steve Doocy on Tuesday that President Joe Biden would not try to influence the Department of Justice liked President Donald Trump did.

Doocy had asked Psaki whether the Biden administration wished the DOJ to resume its investigation into harassment allegations against Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York.

Earlier Tuesday, the New York attorney general's office said it found that the governor had sexually harassed nearly a dozen women, most of whom were state employees.

Cuomo defended himself against the allegations, saying that "the facts are much different than what has been portrayed."

"Does the administration want the Justice Department to initiate a civil rights investigation into these harassment allegations revealed today?" Doocy asked.

"We do something new here that feels foreign from the last four years and allow the Justice Department to act independently on investigations," Psaki responded.

Psaki was referring to Trump's attempts to interfere in Justice Department investigations, detailed in multiple news reports.

Trump last year pressed department officials to declare that the presidential election was rigged against him, despite a lack of evidence to support the theory, The New York Times reported in July.

A note about the conversation said Trump had asked Jeffrey Rosen, then the acting attorney general, and Richard Donoghue, his deputy, to "just say that the election was corrupt + leave the rest to me."

The Department of Justice has not indicated whether it will investigate the harassment allegations detailed by the New York attorney general's office.

The department said in July that it would not pursue an investigation into whether Cuomo's administration mishandled COVID-19 outbreaks in nursing homes, Bloomberg reported.

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