When Donald Trump won a second term nearly 10 weeks ago, it marked the beginning of the end of special counsel Jack Smith’s criminal cases against the president-elect. Almost immediately after Election Day, the prosecutor and his team grudgingly wrapped up their work — not because they wanted to, or because they lacked compelling evidence, but because of Justice Department guidelines related to prosecuting a sitting president.
Smith’s resignation was inevitable, and as my MSNBC colleague Clarissa-Jan Lim noted, it was tucked into a brief filed Saturday.
Trump, who’s spent much of his pre-inaugural transition period railing hysterically against the special counsel, posted an item to his social media platform that read in part, “Deranged Jack Smith was fired today by the DOJ. He is a disgrace to himself, his family, and his Country.”
In reality, of course, there’s an important difference between resigning and being fired, but the Republican kept going, publishing a follow-up item falsely asserting that the prosecutor and his colleagues “were sent packing.” Hours later, the president-elect endorsed and amplified an online message that said Smith, among other prosecutors, should be “disbarred” and “indicted.”
Why bother with a blizzard of attacks against a special counsel as he ends his cases and exits the Justice Department? I won’t pretend to be able to read Trump’s mind, but it appears the Republican remains concerned about the fact that Smith’s final report on his investigations and their findings might yet reach the public.
As last week got underway, the president-elect launched an effort to block the release of Smith’s findings, and as this week got underway, Trump publicly questioned why the prosecutor should even be “allowed” to follow law enforcement guidelines. This was his online statement in its entirety:
Why would Deranged Jack Smith be allowed to issue a “report” on a complete and total Witch Hunt against me, strictly for political purposes, when he was thrown off the case and ultimately dismissed by the DOJ. Therefore, to put it nicely, he was illegitimately involved in this political persecution, and all of the hundreds of millions of dollars spent by our hapless government were, simply put, wasted! He has already filled thousands of rejected statements and documents against me, which were a “joke,” and the public just voted for me, in a landslide, to be their President!
The claim-to-lie ratio in Trump’s missive was effectively 1:1. Smith isn’t “deranged”; his cases were not a “witch hunt”; the cases were not brought for “political purposes”; he wasn’t “dismissed” by the Justice Department; the special counsel’s work wasn’t “illegitimate”; there was no “persecution”; the prosecutor’s court filings were not a “joke”; and the president-elect wasn’t elected in a “landslide.”
But of particular interest was the Republican’s insistence that Americans should not see Smith’s final findings.
It’s important to emphasize that, as NBC News recently explained, the Justice Department’s special counsel regulations require Smith to file a report to the attorney general “explaining his charging decisions before he steps down.” As part of that same process, the incoming president’s legal defense team has already been able to review a draft copy of the special counsel’s report. Evidently, Team Trump didn’t like what it saw. So what happens now? Writing for MSNBC late last week, Carol C. Lam, a former U.S. attorney, explained that Smith’s findings have been “caught in limbo“ in recent weeks, adding, “What we’re left with is the dizzying spectacle, a damning report and a convicted felon just two weeks away from becoming president of the United States, after which time he will likely try to discredit and bury both the investigation and the report itself.” Complicating matters, Steve Vladeck, a law professor at Georgetown University, further explained that it’s still possible that the U.S. Supreme Court might very well be “dragged into” the question regarding Smith’s report. With seven days remaining before Inauguration Day, it’s an open question as to when or whether the special counsel’s findings will reach the public. Watch this space.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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