 "Key takeaways from Jack Smith's report that says Trump tried to overturn 2020 elections")
Special Counsel Jack Smith has finally released his report on the January 6 insurrection.
Smith in the 137-page report, which was submitted on January 7, reiterated his decision to bring charges against Donald Trump.
He said Trump would have been convicted for trying to overturn the 2020 election had voters not returned him to the White House.
But who is Smith? What do we know about the report on Trump and what are its takeaways?
Let’s take a closer look:
Who is Smith?
As per Britannica, Smith was born on June 5, 1969.
His full name is John Luman Smith.
He was brought up in Clay suburb in Syracuse, New York.
He went to the State University of New York (SUNY) at Oneonta from which he graduated summa cum laude in 1991.
He next attended Harvard Law School, where he received a Juris Doctor degree in 1994.
Smith then worked as a prosecutor in the Manhattan District Attorney’s office till 1999 and then served in the Brooklyn office of the US attorney for the Eastern District of New York.
Smith served in a variety of positions here including chief of criminal litigation.
As per BBC, Smith went after violent gangs, white-collar criminals and looked into cases of public corruption during his tenure as the US attorney.
He once spent a weekend sleeping in the hallway of an apartment building so he could convince a woman to take the witness stand in a domestic violence case.
He was also part of the team that investigated the assault of Haitian immigrant Abner Louima with a broomstick by the New York police.
The New York Times reported that it was his work on the team that in part led to Smith becoming Special Counsel.
Smith in 2008 became director of investigations for the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague.
It was a position he served till 2010, when he returned to the United States to become head of the DOJ’s Public Integrity Section.
Smith told The Associated Press in 2010 that he saw the role of a prosecutor as serving people like his parents and others he grew up with in the town of Clay.
“They pay their taxes, follow the rules, and they expect their public officials to do the same,” he said then.
He described the change as leaving “the dream job for a better one.”
Smith had returned to the Justice Department at the time to oversee the department’s then-troubled public integrity section, which was battered publicly for failing to turn over exculpatory evidence in the criminal trial of former Alaska Senator Ted Stevens, a Republican.
Supporters lauded him as apolitical and hardworking.
During his tenure, his unit brought a series of high-profile cases against elected officials from both political parties. Not all were successful, and not all investigations resulted in criminal charges.
As per BBC, a corruption case brought against ex- Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell was overturned by the US Supreme Court.
The case against John Edwards saw the jury acquit the ex-Democratic vice-presidential nominee on one count and remained hung on all the others.
However, Smith did get ex-New York state Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver sent to prison for corruption.
Former Arizona congressman Rick Renzi – later pardoned by Trump – was also convicted.
Smith later said that the failures were a powerful lesson.
When there isn’t sufficient evidence to bring a case, “you have to be able to admit that if it’s not there, it’s not there,” Smith said. “I think that’s hard for people to do, and having been a prosecutor for 15 years that is something I can do.”
Smith then served as first assistant US attorney and then acting US attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee (2015–17).
He was also vice president and head of litigation for the Hospital Corporation of America (2017–18).
As per BBC, Smith left government after not being permanently appointed by the Trump administration.
In 2018, Smith went back to the ICC.
He served as a “specialist prosecutor” of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide committed by or against citizens of Kosovo between 1998 and 2000, as per Britannica.
Then, in November 2022, Smith was tapped to serve as the Special Counsel by Attorney General Merrick Garland.
Smith was tasked to look into the presence of classified documents at Trump’s Florida estate as well as key aspects of a separate probe involving the January 6, 2021, insurrection and efforts to undo the 2020 election.
The New York Times reported that Smith at the time was getting ready to try ex-Kosovo president Hashim Thaci.
The move came just three days after Trump formally launched his 2024 candidacy.
“The Department of Justice has long recognised that in certain extraordinary cases, it is in the public’s interest to appoint a special prosecutor to independently manage an investigation and prosecution,” Garland said at the time.
“Throughout his career, Jack Smith has built a reputation as an impartial and determined prosecutor who leads teams with energy and focus to follow the facts wherever they lead,” Garland said. “As special counsel, he will exercise independent prosecutorial judgment to decide whether charges should be brought.”
“The extraordinary circumstances here demand it,” Garland said of the appointment.
Smith said he intended to do his work independently and “in the best traditions of the Department of Justice.”
“The pace of the investigations will not pause or flag under my watch,” he vowed.
As per BBC, Smith is a triathlete.
He has finished over 100 triathlons since 2002 and even representing Team USA in the World Triathlon.
New York attorney Moe Fodeman, a friend and ex-colleague, told CNN that Smith was a “literally insane” triathlete and “one of the best trial lawyers I have ever seen”.
Lanny Breuer, who led the department’s criminal division when Smith ran the public integrity section, called Smith “an exquisite lawyer and an exquisite prosecutor.”
“He’s not political at all,” Breuer said. “He’s straight down the middle.”
Trump on the other hand had called Smith’s appointment a “horrendous abuse of power” and “the latest in a long series of witch hunts,” and insisted he’d “done nothing wrong.”
BBC quoted Trump as saying that Smith had “destroyed a lot of lives.”
“What he’s done is just horrible,” Trump added. “The abuse of power - it is prosecutorial misconduct.”
The report on Trump and its takeaways
Smith’s report on Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election was sent to Congress on Tuesday.
This, after US District Judge Aileen Cannon refused to block its release.
A separate volume of the report focused on Trump’s hoarding of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, actions that formed the basis of a separate indictment against Trump, will remain under wraps for now.
Smith had dropped both cases against Trump after he defeated Vice-President Kamala Harris in the November 5 election.
Smith argued that a longstanding Justice Department rule against prosecuting sitting presidents made the cases against Trump untenable.
Smith in the report said Trump had interrupted a democratic process that had “operated in a peaceful and orderly manner for more than 130 years.”
Smith in the letter to Garland completely defended his decision to bring charges against Trump.
“To have done otherwise on the facts developed during our work would have been to shirk my duties as a prosecutor and a public servant. After nearly 30 years of public service, that is a choice I could not abide,” he wrote as per NPR.
“The Department’s view that the Constitution prohibits the continued indictment and prosecution of a President is categorical and does not turn on the gravity of the crimes charged, the strength of the Government’s proof, or the merits of the prosecution, which the Office stands fully behind,” the report states.
Smith also denied any allegations of political interference.
“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,” he wrote.
“I can assure you that neither l nor the prosecutors on my team would have tolerated or taken part in any action by our Office for partisan political purposes. My Office had one north star: to follow the facts and law wherever they led. Nothing more and nothing less.”
“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 wrote as per Time Magazine. “I believe the example our team set for others to fight for justice without regard for the personal costs matters.”
Smith also detailed the ways in which Trump sought to impede the investigation.
“Mr Trump’s resort to intimidation and harassment during the investigation was not new, as demonstrated by his actions during the charged conspiracies,” Smith wrote.
“A fundamental component of Mr Trump’s conduct underlying the charges in the Election Case was his pattern of using social media—at the time, Twitter—to publicly attack and seek to influence state and federal officials, judges, and election workers who refused to support false claims that the election had been stolen or who otherwise resisted complicity in Mr Trump’s scheme,” he added.
Smith insisted that the evidence would have led to Trump being convicted at trial were he not elected president.
“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,” the report concluded.
Smith resigned from the US Justice Department on January 10.
As per Al Jazeera, Trump previously called Smith ‘deranged’ and vowed to prosecute those who investigated him.
He responded early Tuesday with a post on his Truth Social platform, claiming he was “totally innocent” and calling Smith “a lamebrain prosecutor who was unable to get his case tried before the Election.” He added, “The voters have spoken!!!”
Trump is set to be inaugurated on January 20.
With inputs from agencies
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