Dec. 19 (UPI) — Attorneys for former special counsel Jack Smith again asked for a public hearing after he testified behind closed doors about his efforts to prosecute President Donald Trump.
The House Judiciary Committee deposed Smith on Wednesday during a closed hearing that lasted for about nine hours, and his attorneys wrote committee Chairman Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, on Thursday to ask for a public hearing, CBS News reported.
“Mr. Smith welcomed this opportunity and hopes that it will serve to correct the many mischaracterizations about the work of the Special Counsel’s Office,” said Smith’s attorneys, Peter Koski and Lanny Breuer.
“During the investigation of President Trump, Mr. Smith steadfastly followed Justice Department policies, observed all legal requirements and took actions based on the facts and the law,” they wrote in their joint letter to Jordan.
“He stands by his decisions,” they said, adding that an open hearing would enable the public to hear Smith directly and not through third-party accounts, according to Politico.
Koski and Breuer also asked Jordan and the committee to release a full recording of Smith’s deposition, during which he said evidence showed Trump illegally mishandled classified documents and tried to overturn the 2020 election results.
During Wednesday’s hearing, Smith told the committee that he would charge Trump again based on the same evidence if given the chance to do so.
Jordan and other House Republicans accused Smith of “prosecutorial misconduct and constitutional abuses” while investigating Trump on behalf of the Biden administration.
They claim Smith tried to silence the president by manipulating evidence against him and raiding his Mar-A-Lago estate without cause after other federal prosecutors said there was no justification to do so, Axios reported.
Neither the classified documents case nor the alleged conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election results case reached the trial stage.
