Rod grew up in Lower Moreland Township, Pennsylvania. Rosenstein graduated from Lower Moreland High School. He has one sister, Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Rosenstein attended the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, where he graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa in 1986 with a Bachelor of Science in economics. After graduating from Penn, Rosenstein attended Harvard Law School where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. Rosenstein graduated from Harvard in 1989 with a Juris Doctor degree, cum laude. He then served as a law clerk to Judge Douglas H. Ginsburg of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He was a Wasserstein Fellow at Harvard Law School from 1997–98. Career Early career After his clerkship, Rosenstein joined the United States Department of Justice through the Attorney General's Honors Program. From 1990 to 1993, he prosecuted public corruption cases as a trial attorney with the Public Integrity Section of the Criminal Division, the latter of which was led by then Assistant Attorney General Robert Mueller. During the Clinton Administration, Rosenstein served as Counsel to Deputy Attorney General Philip B. Heymann (1993–1994) and Special Assistant to Criminal Division Assistant Attorney General Jo Ann Harris (1994–1995). Rosenstein then worked in the United States Office of the Independent Counsel under Ken Starr on the Whitewater investigation into President Bill Clinton. As an Associate Independent Counsel from 1995 to 1997, he was co-counsel in the trial of three defendants who were convicted of fraud, and he supervised the investigation that found no basis for criminal prosecution of White House officials who had obtained FBI background reports. United States Attorney Lynne A. Battaglia hired Rosenstein as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of Maryland in 1997. From 2001 to 2005, Rosenstein served as Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Tax Division of the United States Department of Justice. He coordinated the tax enforcement activities of the Tax Division, the U.S. Attorneys' Offices and the IRS, and he supervised 90 attorneys and 30 support employees. He oversaw civil litigation and served as the acting head of the Tax Division when Assistant Attorney General Eileen J. O'Connor was unavailable, and he personally briefed and argued civil appeals in several federal appellate courts. U.S. Attorney President George W. Bush