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Rep. Jim Jordan, the committee chair, charged in a letter to
Smith that his prosecutions of Trump were “partisan and
politically motivated.” Smith has come under particular scrutiny
on Capitol Hill, especially after the Senate Judiciary Committee
said last week that his investigation had included an FBI
analysis of phone records for more than half a dozen Republican
lawmakers from the week of Jan. 6, 2021
Smith brought two cases against Trump, one accusing him of
conspiring to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential
election and the other of hoarding classified documents at his
Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. Both were brought in 2023, well
over a year before the 2024 presidential election, and
indictments in the two cases cited what Smith and his team
described as clear violations of well-established federal law.
Former Attorney General Merrick Garland, who named Smith as
special counsel in November 2022, has repeatedly said politics
played no part in the handling of the cases.
Smith abandoned the criminal cases against Trump after he won
the presidential election last year. Trump’s return to the White
House precluded the federal prosecutions, as well as paved the
way for Republicans to go after Trump’s political and legal
opponents.
Jordan wrote to Smith: “Your testimony is necessary to
understand the full extent to which the Biden-Harris Justice
Department weaponized federal law enforcement.”
In just the last weeks, the Trump administration has pursued
criminal charges against both James Comey, the former FBI
director, and New York Attorney General Letitia James, who for
years investigated and sued Trump.
Rep. Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary
Committee, said in a statement that “everyone can see the irony”
of the committee demanding testimony from Smith at a time when
Trump has demanded the prosecutions of Comey and James.
The House Judiciary Committee has been looking into Smith's
actions as special counsel since the start of the year. Jordan
said that it had interviewed two other members of Smith's
prosecutorial team, but they had declined to answer many
questions, citing the Fifth Amendment.
An attorney for Smith did not immediately respond to a request
for comment on the House Judiciary Committee's interview
request.
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