Former Special Counsel to Defend Trump Prosecution in Congressional Hearing
Former special counsel Jack Smith will appear before the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday, expressing no regrets about pursuing criminal charges against former President Donald Trump. According to prepared remarks obtained by HuffPost, Smith will state unequivocally that "President Trump was charged because the evidence established that he willfully broke the very laws that he took an oath to uphold."
Indictments and Legal Obstacles
Smith secured two grand jury indictments against Trump for his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election results and for retaining classified documents after leaving office. However, due to the Justice Department's policy against prosecuting sitting presidents, both cases were effectively suspended when Trump returned to the White House, preventing Smith from taking the matters to trial.
This hearing represents Smith's first public opportunity to defend his investigative work and confront Republican critics who have spent years attacking his credibility. House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) previewed the hearing by telling reporters, "It'll just show that Jack Smith was sort of the culmination of this 10-year, this decade-long attack on the president. It just didn't fly."
Previous Private Deposition and Contentious Exchange
In December, Jordan subpoenaed Smith for a private deposition despite Smith's repeated requests for a public hearing. Following that closed-door session, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) praised Jordan's decision to keep the testimony private, stating that Smith's account was "absolutely devastating to the president and all the president's men involved in the insurrectionary activities of January the 6th."
A transcript of the deposition released on New Year's Eve revealed a forceful exchange between Smith and Republican questioners. When Jordan asked whether the First Amendment protected Trump's false statements about the 2020 election being rigged or stolen, Smith responded definitively: "Absolutely not. If they are made to target a lawful government function and they are made with knowing falsity, no, they are not."
Jordan pressed further, questioning why Trump couldn't speak out like previous presidential candidates who disputed election outcomes. Smith clarified: "As we said in the indictment, he was free to say that he thought he won the election. He was even free to say falsely that he won the election. But what he was not free to do was violate federal law and use knowing ― knowingly false statements about election fraud to target a lawful government function." This referred specifically to Trump's efforts to disrupt the certification of election results on January 6, 2021.
Controversial Investigative Tactics
Smith also defended his decision to obtain court orders for secretly collecting "toll records" from members of Congress who communicated with Trump during the Capitol siege. Republicans are expected to challenge this approach during Thursday's hearing. In his deposition, Smith explained the significance of this evidence: "Trump was getting calls 'from people he trusts, calls from people he relies on ― and still refuses to come to the aid of the people at the Capitol. That's very important evidence for criminal intent in our case.'"
The upcoming hearing promises to be a significant confrontation between the former special counsel and his Republican critics, with Smith prepared to justify his prosecutorial decisions based on what he describes as clear evidence of legal violations by the former president.
