Merrick Garland

Oct. 24 (UPI) — Former special counsel Jack Smith wants to testify in open hearings before the House and Senate Judiciary Committees about his investigations of President Donald Trump.

On Thursday, Smith’s lawyers sent letters to Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, who lead the chambers’ panels. Trump was indicted in two cases: attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election and possession of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago home in Florida.

On Oct. 14, Jordan demanded that he testify behind closed doors with a transcript available, writing “your testimony is necessary to understand the full extent to which the Biden-Harris Justice Department weaponized federal law enforcement.” Jordan accused him of prosecutorial overreach and evidence manipulation.

But Smith, who resigned from his position before Trump returned to office in January, wants the hearings in public.

“Given the many mischaracterizations of Mr. Smith’s investigation into President Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified documents and role in attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 election, Mr. Smith respectfully requests the opportunity to testify in open hearings before the House and Senate Judiciary Committees,” his attorneys, Lanny Breuer and Peter Koski, wrote.

Smith will need approval from the Justice Department, where he was employed when Joe Biden was president.

Smith’s attorneys said he will need guidance so he won’t violate rules to guard jury testimony.

“He is prepared to answer questions about the Special Counsel’s investigation and prosecution, but requires assurance from the Department of Justice that he will not be punished for doing so,” the letter said.

Smith’s lawyers also asked for “access to the Special Counsel files, which he no longer has the ability to access.”

“Jack Smith certainly has a lot of answering to do, but first, Congress needs to have all the facts at its disposal,” Grassley told CNN in a statement. “Hearings should follow once the investigative foundation has been firmly set, which is why I’m actively working with the DOJ and FBI to collect all relevant records that Mr. Smith had years to become familiar with.”

Smith issued reports on both cases but the one on Trump’s handling of sensitive documents found at Mar-a-Lago hasn’t been released. Attorney General Merrick Garland, before leaving office, said he wouldn’t release the report because of a criminal case involving two of Trump’s co-defendants was ongoing. But when Trump was elected president again, both cases were dropped.

The president and Republicans in Congress have accused Smith of pursuing politically motivated cases against Trump in an effort to undermine his candidacy for a second term.

But Smith “steadfastly adhered to established legal standards and Department of Justice guidelines, consistent with his approach throughout his career as a dedicated public servant,” while leading the investigations, the letter said.

Rep. Jamie Raskkin, a Democrat serving a district in Maryland, told The Hill that Smith’s offer should be accepted.

“Mr. Smith has made clear that he is prepared to address those allegations publicly, and I can think of no reason to deny the American people the opportunity to hear his testimony, under oath and with questioning from Members of both parties, and to let all Americans judge for themselves the integrity of Mr. Smith’s investigations,” Raskin wrote Thursday.

“There is no reason his appearance should be in the shadows of a backroom and subject to the usual tiresome partisan tactics of leak-and-distort.”

This week, it was reported Trump is pressing for his Justice Department to pay roughly $230 million as a settlement for two investigations. One involved the documents case and the other was ties of his 2016 campaign to the Russian government, which was investigated by another special counsel, Robert Mueller. No charges in the latter were made because of the ability to indict a sitting president.

Smith hadn’t spoken much publicly about his office’s investigations or through case failings.

On Oct. 8, he was interviewed by Andrew Weissman at University College London. Weissman was part of Mueller’s investigations and is now an MSNBC analyst.

“The idea that politics played a role in who worked on that case, or who got chosen, is ludicrous,” Smith told Weissmann.

“The people on my team were similar to what I saw throughout the [Department of Justice] throughout my career,” he said. “Apolitical people who wanted to do the right thing and do public service.”

Oct. 24 (UPI) — A 41-year-old Guatemalan man was extradited to the United States on charges related to a December 2021 crash in Mexico that killed 55 and injured 105 people who were smuggled.

Daniel Zavala Ramos was arrested on Aug. 7 in Boqueron, Guatemala, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

The crash took place on Dec. 9, when a tractor-trailer hit a pedestrian bridge, collided with a truck and overturned in the Mexican state of Chiapas, near the border with Guatemala. There were survivors.

On the third anniversary of the crash in 2024, Zavala Ramos and five others were charged with human smuggling. Among them, Jorge Agapito Ventura was arrested at his home in Cleveland, with one later in custody last May and three in September.

Zavala Ramos’ name in the indictment was blacked out.

If convicted, they face up to life in prison and a maximum $250,000 fine.

The case was certified as complex.

The six face charges of conspiracy to bring illegal aliens into the U.S, placing life in jeopardy, causing serious bodily harm and resulting in deaths.

“The Justice Department is holding accountable the individuals who we allege preyed on vulnerable migrants and are responsible for this heinous crime that resulted in the deaths of over 50 people and injured over 100 more,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said. “Human smugglers should heed these charges and arrests as a warning: you will be held accountable for your deadly crimes.”

Zavala Ramas surrendered to U.S. authorities on Tuesday and made his initial court appearance in Laredo, Texas, on Thursday.

From October 2021 to February 203, DOJ said they worked with others smugglers to transport people from Guatemala through Mexico into the United States.

“They allegedly recruited them, collected payment and arranged travel by foot, microbuses, cattle trucks and tractor-trailers,” DOJ said in a news release.

Unaccompanied children were smuggled, DOJ said.

Those being transported were given instructions on what to say if apprehended, authorities said.

Conducting the joint investigation were Immigration and Customs Enforcement with Homeland Security Investigations.

“This DOJ is investigating and prosecuting human smuggling more aggressively than ever before, and Joint Task Force Alpha is the tip of the spear,” Attorney General Pamela Bondi said in September. “We will not rest until those who profit from the suffering of vulnerable people — including many unaccompanied children — face severe, comprehensive justice.”

The investigation was part of Operation Take Back America, a nationwide initiative utilizing the full resources of the DOJ to prevent illegal immigration and eliminate cartels and transnational criminal organizations in an effort to “protect our communities from the perpetrators of violent crime,” DOJ said.

Aug. 22 (UPI) — Former Jeffrey Epstein girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell told federal investigators that she never saw President Donald Trump do anything illegal or improper.

Federal investigators recently interviewed Maxwell for two days to learn more about what she might know regarding illegal activities related to Epstein.

She dismissed claims that the files contain condemning information about Trump.

“I actually never saw the president in any type of massage setting,” Maxwell told the DOJ investigators, as reported by The New York Times.

“I never witnessed the president in any inappropriate setting in any way,” she said.

“President Trump was always very cordial and very kind to me,” Maxwell said. “I admire his extraordinary achievement in becoming the president now.”

Maxwell said she likes the president and always has, while she was being interviewed by Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche last month in Florida.

The Justice Department released a redacted transcript and audio files of the two-day interview on Friday.

Maxwell also denied that Epstein maintained a list of powerful individuals or engaged in a blackmail campaign to obtain money or favors from them.

She said Epstein likely had no association with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Maxwell also told Blanche she does not believe Epstein committed suicide but said he was not killed to protect powerful individuals.

Epstein was a controversial financier and convicted sex offender who killed himself in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking and child sex abuse charges in New York City.

Other files held by the Department of Justice and related to the federal investigations of Epstein and Maxwell also were released on Friday.

Maxwell is serving a 20-year federal prison sentence after her 2021 conviction for conspiring with Epstein to sexually abuse minors over a 10-year period.

The DOJ was to begin sending some of the Jeffrey Epstein investigation files to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Friday.

The committee on Aug. 5 had subpoenaed the DOJ to gain access to the investigation files, which the DOJ agreed to begin sharing on Friday after redacting the names of alleged victims and child sex abuse materials, NPR reported.

Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., anticipated receipt of hundreds of Epstein file documents on Friday and has said at least some of them eventually will be made public.

“We’re going to be transparent,” Comer told media earlier this week. “We’re doing what we said we would do. We’re getting the documents.”

Comer submitted 11 subpoenas for federal investigation files regarding Epstein and his imprisoned accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell, plus testimony from well-known witnesses.

The list of subpoenaed witnesses’ testimonies includes those by former President Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, former FBI Directors James Comey and Robert Mueller, and former Attorneys General Bill Barr and Merrick Garland.

Committee members are to consult with the DOJ to ensure any shared files will not affect ongoing investigations and criminal cases, Forbes reported.

Although the files have not been made public yet, at least one congressional Democrat claims the Trump administration employed a distraction tactic to divert attention away from the Epstein files.

The FBI on Friday raided the home of former Trump administration National Security Adviser John Bolton for unknown reasons.

“It looks political” and “an attempt to distract from the other big news of the day, which is the first production of the Epstein files,” Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., told CNN on Friday, as reported by The Daily Beast.

He accused the Trump administration of wanting to “change the conversation repeatedly” and said such events will “happen every day because they don’t want people talking about the Epstein files or about their mismanagement of the economy.”

Bolton was President Donald Trump’s national security adviser from April 2018 to September 2019 and has become a vocal critic of the president.

Trump said he was not briefed on the FBI’s raid, The Guardian reported.

WASHINGTON — The House Oversight Committee subpoenaed the Justice Department on Tuesday for files in the Jeffrey Epstein sex-trafficking investigation and is seeking depositions with the Clintons and former law enforcement officials, part of a congressional probe that lawmakers believe may show links to President Trump and former top officials.

The Republican-controlled committee issued subpoenas for depositions with former President Clinton, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and eight former top law enforcement officials.

The committee’s actions showed how even with lawmakers away from Washington on a monthlong break, interest in the Epstein files is still running high. Trump has denied prior knowledge of Epstein’s crimes and claimed he cut off their relationship long ago, and he has repeatedly tried to move past the Justice Department’s decision not to release a full accounting of the investigation. But lawmakers from both major political parties, as well as many in the Republican president’s political base, have refused to let it go.

Rep. James Comer of Kentucky, the Republican chair of the Oversight Committee, noted in letters to U.S. Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi and the former officials that the cases of Epstein and his former girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell “have received immense public interest and scrutiny.”

“While the Department undertakes efforts to uncover and publicly disclose additional information related to Mr. Epstein and Ms. Maxwell’s cases, it is imperative that Congress conduct oversight of the federal government’s enforcement of sex-trafficking laws generally, and specifically, its handling of the investigation and prosecution of Mr. Epstein and Ms. Maxwell,” Comer said.

Epstein’s circle

Since Epstein’s 2019 death in a New York jail cell as he awaited trial on sex-trafficking charges, conservative conspiracists have stoked theories about what information investigators gathered on Epstein — and who else knew about his sexual abuse of teenage girls. Republican lawmakers on the House Oversight Committee nodded to that line of questioning last month by initiating the subpoenas for the Clintons, both Democrats, as well as demanding all communications between President Biden’s Democratic administration and the Justice Department regarding Epstein.

Bill Clinton was among a number of luminaries acquainted with Epstein, a wealthy financier, before the criminal investigation against him in Florida became public two decades ago. Clinton has never been accused of wrongdoing by any of the women who say Epstein abused them.

One of Epstein’s victims, Virginia Giuffre, once gave a newspaper interview in which she described riding in a helicopter with Clinton and flirting with Trump, but she later said in a deposition that those things hadn’t actually happened and were mistakes by the reporter. Clinton has previously said through a spokesperson that while he traveled on Epstein’s jet, he never visited his homes and had no knowledge of his crimes.

The committee is also demanding interviews under oath from former attorneys general spanning the last four presidential administrations: Merrick Garland, William Barr, Jeff Sessions, Loretta Lynch, Eric Holder and Alberto Gonzales. Lawmakers also subpoenaed former FBI Directors James Comey and Robert Mueller.

However, it was Democrats who sparked the move to subpoena the Justice Department for its files on Epstein. They were joined by some Republicans last month to successfully initiate the subpoena through a subcommittee of the House Oversight Committee.

“Today was an important step forward in our fight for transparency regarding the Epstein files and our dedication to seeking justice for the victims,” said Democratic Reps. Robert Garcia of Long Beach, the top Democrat on the committee, and Summer Lee of Pennsylvania, who initiated the subpoena, in a joint statement. “Now, we must continue putting pressure on the Department of Justice until we actually receive every document.”

Will the subpoenas be enforced?

The subpoenas give the Justice Department until Aug. 19 to hand over the requested records, though such requests are typically open to negotiation and can be resisted by the Trump administration.

The committee is also asking the former officials to appear for the depositions throughout August, September and October, concluding with Hillary Clinton on Oct. 9 and Bill Clinton on Oct. 14.

Multiple former presidents have voluntarily testified before Congress, but none has been compelled to do so. That history was invoked by Trump in 2022, between his first and second terms, when he faced a subpoena by the House committee investigating the deadly Jan. 6, 2021, riot by a mob of his supporters at the U.S. Capitol.

Lawyers for Trump resisted the subpoena, citing decades of legal precedent they said shielded an ex-president from being ordered to appear before Congress. The committee ultimately withdrew its subpoena.

The committee had previously issued a subpoena for an interview with Maxwell, who had been serving a prison sentence in Florida for luring teenage girls to be sexually abused by Epstein but was recently transferred to a Texas facility.

However, Comer has indicated he is willing to delay that deposition until after the Supreme Court decides whether to hear an appeal to her conviction. She argues she was wrongfully prosecuted.

As the Justice Department has tried to appease demands for more disclosure, it has turned attention to Maxwell. Officials interviewed her for 1 1/2 days last month.

But Democrats stressed the importance of gaining direct access to the investigative files, rather than relying on Maxwell’s words.

“We need these files now in order to corroborate any claims she makes,” Garcia and Lee said, adding: “This fight is not over.”

Prosecutors say there’s not much new in grand jury transcripts

Another way the Trump administration is trying to address the public clamor for more transparency is by asking federal judges to unseal grand jury transcripts in the cases against Epstein and Maxwell. But prosecutors indicated Monday the public already knows a lot of what’s in the documents.

Much of the information “was made publicly available at trial or has otherwise been publicly reported through the public statements of victims and witnesses,” prosecutors wrote in court papers Monday.

The prosecutors also made clear they’re seeking to unseal only the transcripts of grand jury witnesses’ testimony, not the exhibits that accompanied it.

Groves writes for the Associated Press. AP writers Jennifer Peltz and David Caruso in New York and Eric Tucker in Washington contributed to this report.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo smiles as he announces New York State’s lifting of all COVID restrictions at One World Trade Center on June 15, 2021. On Tuesday, the Justice Department launched a criminal investigation into the former governor — and New York City mayoral candidate — over last year’s Congressional testimony on nursing home deaths, a person briefed on the matter told The New York Times, CNN and NBC. File Photo by John Angelillo/UPI | License Photo

May 21 (UPI) — The Justice Department has launched a criminal investigation into former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo over his testimony last year to Congress, according to a report Tuesday.

House Republicans have accused Cuomo, who is currently a mayoral candidate for New York City, of lying to the House Oversight Committee about nursing home deaths in the state during the COVID-19 pandemic.

On Tuesday, two people briefed on the matter revealed that the Justice Department had opened a criminal investigation in response, according to The New York Times — which was the first to report — as well as CNN and NBC.

The Justice Department’s inquiry comes after it recently withdrew a separate corruption prosecution of current New York City Mayor Eric Adams, who is running for re-election against Cuomo.

Following last year’s testimony, House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., claimed there was “overwhelming evidence” that Cuomo, 67, undercounted the total number of deaths in New York senior care facilities by 46%, during an audit in July 2020.

Cuomo insisted during the hearing that he had not drafted, reviewed or consulted on the nursing home report, which was published by the New York State Department of Health.

Comer referred Cuomo for prosecution last year, but was denied by former Attorney General Merrick Garland. The House GOP-led panel renewed that prosecution effort last month.

“Governor Cuomo testified truthfully to the best of his recollection about events four years earlier, and he offered to address any follow-up questions from the subcommittee — but from the beginning this was all transparently political,” Rich Azzopardi, a spokesperson for Cuomo, said Tuesday in a statement as he denied knowledge of the investigation.

“We have never been informed of any such matter, so why would someone leak it now? The answer is obvious,” Azzopardi said. “This is lawfare and election interference plain and simple — something President Trump and his top Department of Justice officials say they are against.”

On Tuesday, Voices for Seniors applauded the investigation, in a post on X, adding it was “overdue.”

“After years of silence, deflection and political spin, the wheels of justice are finally beginning to turn,” the group said. “This investigation is not just justified, it’s overdue. The evidence paints a damning picture of a leader more concerned with image than integrity. Grieving families have waited long enough.”

“We call on the DOJ to pursue this case with relentless urgency. Voices for Seniors stands prepared to cooperate fully.”