Smith defends Trump prosecution as final Jan. 6 report released to the public

Special counsel Jack Smith in a final report on his investigation into President-elect Trump released publicly early Tuesday morning said his determinations were free from political interference and that, if permitted to proceed, his cases would have likely secured a conviction. 

Smith made the claims both in a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland and in the much awaited release of the election interference volume of his final report.

In his letter to Garland, Smith broke his silence on over a year of attacks from Trump, who accused Smith of being at the helm of a politically motivated prosecution. 

“The ultimate decision to bring charges against Mr. Trump was mine. It is a decision I stand behind fully,” Smith wrote, adding that Garland nor anyone else at DOJ pushed him to prosecute Trump.

“To all who know me well, the claim from Mr. Trump that my decisions as a prosecutor were influenced or directed by the Biden administration or other political actors is, in a word, laughable.”

The release of the report comes after a swift court battle launched by Trump as he and his co-defendants in the Mar-a-Lago case sought to block both volumes of Smith’s report from being shared with the public.

Ultimately, U.S. District Court Judge Aileen Cannon cleared the way for the volume dealing with Jan. 6 to be published.

The public release does not include a second volume Smith wrote concerning the prosecution of Trump for his handling of classified documents. Garland has indicated he does not plan to release that section, given that the case remains pending as to Trump’s former co-defendants.

The report offers a first glimpse at Smith’s inner thoughts in how to approach the case, as he has spoken publicly about the case only on the day he was appointed special counsel.

Smith, who resigned on Friday, details his decision to ask the court to dismiss charges against Trump after he won re-election, writing that he believed he would have scored a conviction against the president-elect in the high stakes case.

“Indeed, but for Mr. Trump's election and imminent return to the Presidency, the Office assessed that the admissible evidence was sufficient to obtain and sustain a conviction at trial,” Smith wrote.

The bulk of the volume released Tuesday – some 174 pages – deals with Smith’s lengthy investigation into Trump’s efforts to thwart the peaceful transfer of power.

By Smith’s own admission, the report largely contains information made public in prior court filings. Trump’s uncharged co-conspirators in the case, though easily identifiable, remain unnamed.

“The throughline of all of Mr. Trump's criminal efforts was deceit-knowingly false claims of election fraud-and the evidence shows that Mr. Trump used these lies as a weapon to defeat a federal government function foundational to the United States' democratic process,” Smith wrote. 

“Until Mr. Trump obstructed it, this democratic process had operated in a peaceful and orderly manner for more than 130 years.” 

The special counsel described prosecuting Trump during his presidential campaign as an “unprecedented challenge,” detailing at length the former president’s efforts to command strong loyalty from potential witnesses and attack prosecutors.

“The Office had no interest in affecting the presidential election, and it complied fully with the letter and spirit of the Department's policy regarding election year sensitivities,” Smith wrote.

The report’s release comes hours after the Justice Department published special counsel David Weiss’s final report detailing his prosecutions of Hunter Biden, the president’s son.