(Reuters) – U.S. special counsel Jack Smith, who led the federal cases against Donald Trump on charges of trying to overturn his 2020 election defeat and mishandling classified documents, has resigned as the newly elected Republican president prepared to to return to the White House. .
Smith resigned from the Justice Department on Friday, according to a lawsuit filed Saturday with U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, asking her to lift an injunction she issued blocking the release of his final report.
Smith's resignation was announced in a footnote to the filing, which said the special counsel had completed his work, filed his final confidential report on January 7 and was “separated” from the Justice Department on January 10.
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Smith, a former war crimes prosecutor, brought two of the four criminal cases Trump faced after he left office, only to see them stall after a Trump-appointed judge in Florida dismissed one and the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed three judges appointed by Trump – found that former presidents enjoy sweeping immunity from prosecution for official actions. Neither case went to trial.
After Trump defeated Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris in the Nov. 5 election, Smith dropped both cases, citing a longstanding Justice Department rule against prosecuting sitting presidents. In asking the courts to dismiss the suit, Smith's team defended the merits of the cases they filed, saying only that Trump's impending return to the White House made them untenable.
Smith's departure is another sign of the collapse of the criminal cases against Trump, which could end without any legal consequences for the new president and trigger a backlash that would fuel his political comeback.
Smith's resignation from the Justice Department was expected. Trump, who has often called Smith “deranged,” had said he would immediately fire him upon taking office on Jan. 20 and has suggested he could pursue retaliation against Smith and others who investigated him once he returns to office.
Trump became the first sitting or former US president to face criminal charges in 2023, first in New York, where he was accused of covering up a hush money payment to a porn star during his 2016 presidential campaign. Smith's charges followed, with Trump being charged accused of illegally withholding classified material after leaving office and of trying to overturn his 2020 loss, a campaign that led to the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol 2021. Prosecutors in Georgia have also charged Trump over his efforts to overturn his election defeat in that state.
TRUMP CLAIMED POLITICAL MOTIVATION
Trump denied wrongdoing and attacked the prosecutions as politically motivated attempts to damage his campaign. He raised millions in campaign contributions through courthouse appearances and used the cases to advance a powerful narrative that the political establishment was turning against him and his supporters.
The Justice Department defended the cases, saying they were led by career prosecutors who operated without political influence.
Garland appointed Smith in November 2022 — nearly two years after the attack on the Capitol — to lead the Justice Department's two ongoing investigations into Trump. The move came just days after Trump announced a campaign to return to the White House in the 2024 election.
Garland, an appointee of Democratic President Joe Biden, said Smith would provide a degree of independence in the highly sensitive investigations. Garland had rejected previous calls to appoint a special prosecutor, insisting he could appropriately oversee Trump's investigations.
Smith returned to Washington from The Hague, where he prosecuted war crimes cases stemming from the 1998-1999 Kosovo War. He previously led the Justice Department's Public Integrity Division and worked in the federal prosecutor's office in Brooklyn, New York, where he built a reputation as a tenacious investigator.
In The Hague, Smith won the conviction of Salih Mustafa, a former commander of the Kosovo Liberation Army who headed a prison where torture took place during the conflict.
HISTORICAL FIRST
The indictments, the first federal cases against a former U.S. president, accused Trump of bringing highly sensitive national security documents to his Florida resort and using false claims of voter fraud to try to derail vote collection and certification after his election loss in 2020.
“The attack on our nation's Capitol on January 6, 2021 was an unprecedented attack on the seat of American democracy. As described in the indictment, it was fueled by lies – lies by the defendant aimed at impeding the fundamental function of American democracy. U.S. government,” Smith said in announcing the indictment against the August 2023 election, one of only two public appearances he made during his investigation.
Smith faced a tight window to wrap up both prosecutions as it was clear Trump could halt them if he won the election. Both faced legal hurdles.
In the classified documents case, Florida-based U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump nominee, dismissed all charges in July after ruling that Smith was improperly appointed as special counsel.
Smith's office appealed this decision. Prosecutors dropped the appeal involving Trump after his election victory but have indicated they will continue an effort to revive charges against two Trump associates accused of obstructing the investigation.
The election case was put on hold for months while Trump's lawyers appealed for presidential immunity. The U.S. Supreme Court largely sided with Trump in August, ruling that Trump could not be prosecuted for many official actions he took as president, leading to more delays in the case.
Smith acknowledged in court filings that his team faced an “unprecedented circumstance” after Trump won the election over Democrat Kamala Harris. His office concluded that both cases could not proceed.
Trump was convicted of falsifying company records after a trial in the New York hush money case brought by prosecutors. His sentencing was postponed indefinitely after his election victory and Trump's lawyers are seeking to have the conviction thrown out in its entirety.
The Georgia case, which also includes charges against 14 Trump allies, remains in limbo while an appeals court determines whether the lead prosecutor, Fani Willis, should be disqualified for misconduct over a romantic affair with a former top deputy. The case against Trump is unlikely to progress as long as he remains president.
(Reporting by Brendan O'Brien in Chicago; additional reporting by Michael Martina; Editing by Daniel Wallis)
