Jack Smith, who as special counsel brought two criminal cases against President Donald Trump, told Congress on Wednesday the basis for his prosecutions "rests entirely with President Trump and his actions."
Smith gave private testimony before the House Judiciary Committee.
Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, committee chairman, had subpoenaed Smith to testify in a closed hearing, though Smith requested a public hearing.
"If asked whether to prosecute a former president based on the same facts today, I would do so regardless of whether the president was a Republican or Democrat," Smith told the committee, according to excerpts from his opening statement.
Smith testified that his team found evidence that showed "beyond a reasonable doubt that President Trump engaged in a criminal scheme to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election and to prevent the lawful transfer of power," Politico reported.
Smith and his team secured indictments in 2023, accusing Trump of illegally retaining classified documents after his first term in office and plotting to overturn his defeat in the 2020 election.
Both cases were dropped after Trump won the 2024 election.
"I made my decisions in the investigation without regard to President Trump's political association, activities, beliefs, or candidacy in the 2024 presidential election," Smith said in his statement.
"We took actions based on what the facts and the law required — the very lesson I learned early in my career as a prosecutor," Smith added.
Republican lawmakers have expressed outrage at disclosures that investigators sought information from a wide range of conservative organizations as part of the investigation of Trump's efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss and obtained limited cellphone data from eight Republican senators for the period around the Jan. 6, 2021, protest at the Capitol by Trump supporters.
Trump allies have pointed to those disclosures as evidence that Smith's inquiry was overzealous and targeted the political opposition.
"President Trump and his associates tried to call members of Congress in furtherance of their criminal scheme, urging them to further delay certification of the 2020 election," Smith said. "I didn't choose those members; President Trump did."
After the hearing, Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., said Smith "spent several hours schooling the Judiciary Committee."
"He didn't come with any particular message, but I'll just say that he's answered every single question to the satisfaction of any reasonable-minded person in that room," Raskin added.
Information from Reuters contributed to this report.
Sam Barron ✉
Sam Barron has almost two decades of experience covering a wide range of topics including politics, crime and business.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.