Former special counsel Jack Smith returned to Congress to answer questions about the investigation into President Donald Trump, giving his first public testimony.
On Thursday, Smith appeared before the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, where he alternated between praise from Democrats and criticism from Republicans.
Recommended stories
list of 3 itemsend of list
Throughout, Smith maintained that his investigation was nonpartisan and that, in fact, there were grounds for two federal indictments during President Trump’s two terms.
“I made this decision without regard to President Trump’s political affiliations, activities, beliefs, or candidacy for the 2024 election,” Smith told a Congressional committee.
“President Trump was indicted because the evidence established that he knowingly broke the law, the very law he was sworn to uphold.”
Smith, a former war crimes prosecutor at the International Tribunal in The Hague, was selected as special prosecutor in 2022 under former US President Joe Biden.
The special counsel is required to operate independently, without the usual day-to-day oversight of politically appointed Justice Department leadership.
But Smith’s mission was a particularly delicate one. He was tasked with investigating Trump, who was Biden’s rival in the 2020 election and will run against him again in the 2024 campaign.
Inside the investigation
The 2020 election was at the center of Smith’s investigation. Such was Trump’s behavior on January 6, 2021, when thousands of his supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to disrupt the certification of the election results.
Smith ultimately determined that Trump intentionally tried to overturn the vote, and in August 2023, a grand jury indicted Trump on four counts: conspiracy to defraud the state, obstruction of an official proceeding, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, and conspiracy to undermine the free exercise of constitutional rights.
A separate grand jury, this time in Florida, issued a second indictment related to a separate investigation that Smith led in June 2023.
The investigation focused on Trump’s decision to ignore subpoenas to reinstate him after leaving office. Trump was ultimately indicted on 40 charges, including conspiracy to obstruct justice, making false statements, and failing to comply with standards regarding classified documents under the Espionage Act.
Both federal lawsuits were dropped after President Trump was reelected in 2024. It is the Department of Justice’s policy not to investigate or prosecute sitting presidents. Smith himself resigned shortly before Trump took office as president in January 2025.
Nevertheless, during Thursday’s hearing, Smith defended the charges and suggested the case would have been successful had the circumstances been different.
“To be clear, I support the decisions I made as special counsel, including the decision to indict President Trump,” Smith told the committee.
“Our investigation produced evidence beyond a reasonable doubt that President Trump engaged in criminal conduct. If you asked me today whether I would prosecute a former president based on the same facts, I would do so regardless of whether he was a Democrat or a Republican.”
He added that because of the evidence, the prosecution should proceed regardless of the high-profile defendants.
“The law required him to be held accountable,” Smith said. “That’s what I did. If I had done anything else regarding the facts of these cases, I would have been evading my duties as a prosecutor.”
In subsequent testimony, he emphasized his position, saying, “We were ready and willing to go to trial in this case.”
Republican criticism
But Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee sought to portray Mr. Smith as a partisan scumbag on a mission to defeat his Democratic political opponents.
Some of the most aggressive questions came from Republican Rep. Darrell Issa of California, who questioned Smith’s independence as special counsel.
“You guys went after your political opponents, just like President Richard Nixon’s men. They may not be your political opponents, but they were definitely Joe Biden’s political opponents, right?” Issa asked.
“They were enemies of the president. And you were their right-hand man, right?”
Mr. Smith responded to the accusation with a single word: “No.”
Issa went on to argue that by spreading false statements denying his loss in the 2020 election, Trump was simply expressing his First Amendment right to free speech.
“Do you understand the Constitution? Do you understand the Bill of Rights that someone has an absolute right to believe something, whether it’s true or not, and to assert something, whether it’s true or not?” Issa said at one point.
“So if you know that people have the right to speak out, to lobby, to advocate, to legally do whatever it takes to get people to decide differently, why did you see criminal behavior for a president who believed he couldn’t win?”
Mr. Smith could not answer that question, but his indictment alleges that Mr. Trump did more than simply express his opposition to the results.
Rather, it alleges that President Trump and his allies sought to recruit “fake electors” to submit fraudulent electoral votes for certification, and highlights evidence that President Trump was trying to pressure elected officials to reject adverse voting results.
Another key point of criticism was Smith’s decision to seek “limited call records” from the phones of nine Republican members of Congress who communicated with President Trump, who is accused of trying to overturn the 2020 election. Among the members targeted was then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy.
Such call records will not include the content of the call in question. Rather, it identifies the source of the call, the recipient, the duration of the connection, and more.
Republicans argued that subpoenaing phone records was not only an invasion of privacy, but also a violation of the U.S. Constitution’s Speech and Debate Clause, which protects members of Congress from legal action arising from their legislative duties.
They also questioned the confidentiality of the subpoena, which Smith argued was necessary.
“The subpoenas we secured were secured through a confidentiality order from a judge because there were serious concerns about obstruction of justice in this investigation,” Smith said.
“With regard to Donald Trump in particular, not only was there obstruction of justice that we were investigating in the classified documents case, but we also became aware during the course of the investigation of the targeting of witnesses.”
Smith defends team’s work
Republicans criticized Smith for what they believed were prosecutorial failures, while Democrats praised him as a model of integrity.
“I want you to lean back today. There’s nothing to be ashamed of. You did everything right,” Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell told Smith.
He then began accusing his Republican colleagues of hypocrisy, especially after the 2021 attack on the Capitol.
“They’re very lucky they’re not being sworn in because they’re going to have to say what they really think about Trump,” Swalwell said, gesturing to Republicans on the panel. “They call him crooked. They call him cruel. They call him vile. I hear you all say that.”
Swalwell invited Smith to reflect on where he was at the time of the Capitol attack and how he felt watching Trump supporters enter the building while members of Congress fled. Mr. Smith was in Europe at the time representing the State Department, working on a war crimes tribunal.
“I was shocked by it. Being in Europe and not following things that closely, I frankly wasn’t up to date on the events leading up to it,” Smith responded. “I had never seen anything like that happen in our country.”
Smith also denied that he was under any pressure from the Biden administration to come to any preliminary conclusions.
“I was given the independence to conduct an investigation,” he said.
Since being appointed special counsel, Smith has often been the target of criticism from the political right. Mr. Trump himself this week called Mr. Smith the “sick son of Abu ***” who heads a group of “hand-picked radical leftist Marxist prosecutors.”
Over the past year, the Trump administration has largely fired and terminated the employment of nonpartisan career federal employees involved in two federal investigations led by Smith.
Smith himself used the committee hearing to slam these decisions, accusing President Trump of seeking retaliation against government employees who have served presidents of both parties.
“I’m proud of the work my team has done, and I appreciate the opportunity to be here today to correct false and misleading narratives about our work,” Smith said during the panel discussion.
“President Trump is seeking revenge against career prosecutors, FBI agents, and support staff simply because they worked on these cases,” he added. “It is wrong to vilify these people and seek retribution. These dedicated public servants are the best among us.”
President responds to Mr. Smith’s testimony
However, Trump appears to have watched Smith’s testimony live. Amid the exchange between the former prosecutor and members of Congress, the president posted a message on Truth Social praising Republicans for removing Smith’s work.
“Deranged Jack Smith faces the death penalty before Congress. It was over when Congress debated his past failures and wrongful prosecution,” Trump wrote. “He destroyed many lives under the guise of legitimacy. Jack Smith is a mad animal and should not be allowed to practice law.”
Trump also suggested that Smith should face professional punishment or even prosecution, similar to how Smith has used social media platforms in the past to pressure the Justice Department to take action against his rivals.
“If he were a Republican, his license would be revoked and it would be worse! I hope the attorney general looks into what he did,” Trump continued.
“It was all a fraud by the Democrats. They should pay dearly for what they have caused our country to suffer!”
Smith was subpoenaed by the House Judiciary Committee in early December and later testified in a closed hearing despite protests that the proceedings should be made public.
He is currently under a gag order that prevents him from divulging evidence related to the classified documents case, but U.S. District Judge Eileen Cannon said she will lift the restraint on his report starting February 24. The Trump administration is appealing this decision.
As part of his prepared remarks, Mr. Smith implored the audience to uphold the rule of law, no matter which political party seeks to undermine it.
“After nearly 30 years in public service, including in the international arena, I have seen firsthand how the rule of law can be eroded,” Smith said. “My concern is that we have seen the rule of law working in our country for so long that many of us have come to take it for granted. The rule of law does not happen automatically. It depends on our collective efforts to apply the rule of law.”
