Just three days after President Donald Trump announced his 2024 presidential campaign, Biden Attorney General Merrick Garland unlawfully appointed prosecutor Jack Smith as special counsel to oversee two criminal investigations into the Republican candidate.
One of the Justice Department’s investigations concerned Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified documents; the other pertained to the imagined efforts by Trump to subvert the 2020 election.
While it was immediately clear to Trump that Smith was “a political hit man who is totally compromised,” Garland’s special counsel soon gave critics cause to suspect the president’s instincts were right once again.
Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey told Blaze Media co-founder and nationally syndicated radio host Glenn Beck last year that the Biden DOJ’s “witch hunt prosecution” of Trump was “not designed to obtain a legally valid conviction. It’s designed to take anyone running against Joe Biden — in other words, president Donald Trump — off the campaign trail.”
Although Trump was ultimately slapped with scores of charges, neither case went anywhere. The classified documents case was torpedoed in July 2024 because of Smiths’ unlawful appointment, and the Jan. 6 case was scuttled in November following Trump’s re-election.
Trump is no longer in hot water; however, Smith appears poised to take a plunge.
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The U.S. Office of Special Counsel confirmed to Reuters on Saturday that it has launched an investigation into whether Smith violated the Hatch Act — a federal law that prohibits government employees both from using their “official authority or influence for the purpose of interfering with or affecting the result of an election” or from engaging in partisan political activity while on official duty time.
The investigation by the independent federal prosecutorial agency follows a request by Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton (R), who has accused Smith of interfering in the 2024 presidential election.
‘President Trump’s astounding victory doesn’t excuse Smith of responsibility for his unlawful election interference.’
“Jack Smith’s legal actions were nothing more than a tool for the Biden and Harris campaigns. This isn’t just unethical, it is very likely illegal campaign activity from a public office,” Cotton wrote.
In a July 30 letter to Jamieson Greer, acting special counsel at the OSC, Cotton highlighted a number of instances where Smith expedited trial proceedings and released provocative information allegedly “with no legitimate purpose.”
Cotton noted, for example, that Smith tried to rush Trump’s election subversion case, demanding a trial start date of Jan. 2, 2024 — just four months and three weeks after Smith filed the indictment against the president.
“Notably,” Cotton wrote, “jury selection was to begin just two weeks before the Iowa caucuses.”
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In another example, Cotton said that Smith filed a brief on Trump’s immunity from prosecution that was 165 pages long — exceeding the normal maximum page limit by four times — and “incorporated grand jury testimony typically kept secret at this point in other proceedings.”
“This action appears to be a deliberate and underhanded effort to disclose unsubstantiated and extensive allegations timed to maximize electoral impact,” Cotton wrote.
“These actions were not standard, necessary, or justified — unless Smith’s real purpose was to influence the election,” wrote the senator. “President Trump of course vanquished Joe Biden, Jack Smith, every Democrat who weaponized the law against him, but President Trump’s astounding victory doesn’t excuse Smith of responsibility for his unlawful election interference.”
The OSC could reportedly refer its findings to the DOJ; however, the Justice Department is already reviewing “politicized” actions taken by Smith, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, and New York Attorney General Letitia James through its Weaponization Working Group.
Blaze News has reached out to the White House for comment. Politico indicated that Smith did not immediately respond to its request for comment.
Smith’s office altogether blew over $47 million in taxpayer dollars on the two failed probes. He noted in his investigative report on Trump, “While we were not able to bring the cases we charged to trial, I believe the fact that our team stood up for the rule of law matters.”
Smith resigned 10 days before the president’s inauguration.
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