President Donald Trump broke the law, former counsel Jack Smith told committee members Thursday at an appearance before the GOP-led House Judiciary Committee.
Smith, who led investigations into Trump’s alleged interference in the 2020 election and alleged mishandling of classified documents, is testifying publicly for first time about his probes.
“President Trump was charged because the evidence established that he willfully broke the law, the very laws he took an oath too uphold,” Smith said. “grand juries in two separate districts reached this Also to be considered: based on his actions as alleged in the indictments they returned.”
Regarding the 2020 election, Smith said that Trump “engaged in a criminal scheme to overturn the results and prevent the lawful transfer of power.”
He also said the president illegally kept classified documents at his Mar-a-lago estate.
“After leaving office in January of ’21, President Trump illegally kept classified documents at his Merrill Lago Social Club and repeatedly tried to obstruct justice to conceal his continued retention of those documents. Highly sensitive national security information withheld in a ballroom and a bathroom,” Smith said.
Smith also said that the facts and the law supported a prosecution, and that he made decisions not based on politics, but the facts and the law.
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He testified that he faced “relentless attacks” as he pursued the investigation into the former president’s handling of classified documents after leaving office and efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
Smith said he was motivated by “my duties as a prosecutor and as a public servant, of which I had no intention of doing.”
He also criticized what he said was the retribution carried out by the president and his allies against agents and prosecutors who investigated the cases.
“My fear is that we have seen the rule of law function in our country for so long that many of us have come to take it for granted,” he said. “The rule of law is not self-executing. It depends on our collective commitment to apply it. It requires dedicated service on behalf of others,especially when that service is difficult and comes with costs. Our willingness to pay those costs is what test and defines our commitment to the rule of law and to this fantastic country.”
In his opening statement,Committee Chairman Jim Jordan blasted Smith for what he called a partisan investigation into President Donald Trump and other Republicans.
“Democrats have been going after President Trump for ten years,for a decade,and the country should never,ever forget what they did,” Jordan said.
