U.S. Special Counsel and Trump prosecutor Jack Smith resigned from the Department of Justice on Friday, according to Politico.
Smith’s resignation comes as President-elect Donald Trump prepares to return to the White House at the end of January, leading Smith to drop both of the criminal cases after they hit significant roadblocks from Trump-appointed judges. Most significant was the Supreme Court ruling in Trump’s favor against Smith, granting former presidents significant immunity from prosecution for official acts, according to Politico.
Despite dropping the cases, Smith defended the charges on their merits, only saying that Trump’s re-election made them “untenable” due to DOJ policy against prosecuting sitting presidents, per Reuters.
Smith was appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland in November 2022 to lead the DOJ’s investigations into Trump allegedly attempting to overturn the 2020 election and mishandling classified documents.
Trump denied all wrongdoing, calling the prosecutions politically motivated retribution from the Biden administration, and raised millions in campaign contributions off the back of the cases against him. Many of Trump’s supporters saw the prosecutions from Smith and others as clear attempts from the political establishment to silence Trump with the law, a powerful narrative Trump exploited until election day.
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Smith was on a short timetable, with many experts concurring that if Trump won the election before Smith’s cases could come to a conclusion, the prosecutions would be shut down, with Smith’s first public appearance since his appointment in November 2022 occurring in August of 2023.
“The attack on our nation’s Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, was an unprecedented assault on the seat of American democracy. As described in the indictment, it was fueled by lies – lies by the defendant, targeted at obstructing the bedrock function of the U.S. government,” Smith accused in a press conference in August of 2023, with Trump being indicted shortly after.
This left a little over a year for Smith to overcome the delays Trump’s legal team was putting on the cases, with both cases locked in legal gridlock, with Trump-appointed Justice Aileen Cannon flat-out dismissing the classified documents case, and going as far as temporarily blocking the public release of Smith’s January 6 report for weeks.
Smith’s resignation marks the end of Trump’s prosecutorial woes federally, with no former president ever being prosecuted prior to Smith’s appointment.