Former particular counsel Jack Smith, testifying Thursday earlier than the GOP-led Home Judiciary Committee, was unequivocal about who brought on the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol.
“Our investigation revealed that Donald Trump is the one that brought on Jan. 6, that it was foreseeable to him and that he sought to take advantage of the violence,” Smith testified. “We adopted the info and we adopted the legislation — the place that led us was to an indictment of an unprecedented prison scheme to dam the peaceable switch of energy.”
Smith, who led investigations into Trump’s alleged interference within the 2020 election and alleged mishandling of categorized paperwork, is testifying publicly for first time about his probes.
Trump pleaded not responsible to all fees in each circumstances, earlier than each circumstances had been dropped following Trump’s reelection because of the Justice Division’s long-standing coverage barring the prosecution of a sitting president.
The previous particular counsel stated that partisan politics didn’t play a task in his choice to cost Trump in his two investigations.
“A number of the strongest witnesses had been witnesses who, actually, had been fellow Republicans who had voted for Donald Trump, who had campaigned for him and, who wished him to win the election. These included state officers, individuals who labored on his marketing campaign and advisors,” Smith stated of his election interference probe.
In in search of to problem the outcomes of the 2020 election, Trump was “in search of methods to remain in energy,” Smith testified.
Former particular counsel Jack Smith, testifies earlier than the Home Judiciary Committee about his investigations into President Donald Trump, within the Rayburn Home Workplace Constructing on Capitol Hill in Washington, January 22, 2026.
Saul Loeb/AFP through Getty Photographs
Trump was not “was not in search of trustworthy solutions about whether or not there was fraud within the election. He was in search of methods to remain in energy. And when individuals informed him, issues that conflicted with him endurance, he rejected them or he selected not even to contact individuals like that,” Smith informed committee members.
Underneath questioning from Democratic Rep. Zoe Lofgren, Smith mentioned the witnesses his staff had interviewed in his election interference probe.
“There have been witnesses who I felt can be very sturdy witnesses, together with, for instance, the secretary of state in Georgia who informed Donald Trump the reality, informed him issues that he didn’t need to hear and put him on discover that what he was saying was false,” Smith stated. “And I imagine that witnesses of that nature, witnesses who’re keen to inform the reality, even when it should impose a value on them of their lives — my expertise as a prosecutor over 30 years is that witnesses like which are very credible, and that jurors are inclined to imagine witnesses like that, as a result of they pay a value for telling the reality.”
Smith stated that he obtained the telephone toll data for some members of Congress as a result of his workplace was investigating the conspiracy to cease the peaceable switch of energy.
“We wished to conduct an intensive investigation of the issues, that had been assigned to me, together with makes an attempt to intrude with the lawful switch of energy. The conspiracy that we had been investigating, it was related to get toll data, to know the scope of that conspiracy, who they had been in search of to coerce, who they had been in search of to affect, who was in search of to assist them,” Smith stated, arguing that it was a standard piece of an investigation.
In a back-and-forth with Republican Rep. Darryl Issa, Smith stated he did not goal then-President Joe Biden’s political enemies.
“Possibly they don’t seem to be your political enemies, however they certain as hell had been Joe Biden’s political enemies, weren’t they? They had been Harris’ political enemies. They had been the enemies of the president and also you had been their arm, weren’t you?” Issa requested.
“No,” Smith stated. “My workplace did not spy on anybody.”
He stated that the choice to carry fees towards Trump was solely his choice and that he was not pressured by any Biden official.
“President Trump was charged as a result of the proof established that he willfully broke the legislation, the very legal guidelines he took an oath to uphold,” Smith stated. “Grand juries in two separate districts reached this conclusion based mostly on his actions as alleged within the indictments they returned.”
In his introductory remarks, Smith additionally stated the president illegally saved categorized paperwork at his Mar-a-Lago property.
Former Particular Counsel Jack Smith arrives to testify earlier than a Home Judiciary Committee listening to about his prison investigation President Donald Trump, on Capitol Hill in Washington, January 22, 2026.
Kylie Cooper/Reuters
“After leaving workplace in January of ’21, President Trump illegally saved categorized paperwork at his Mar-a-Lago Social Membership and repeatedly tried to impede justice to hide his continued retention of these paperwork. Extremely delicate nationwide safety info withheld in a ballroom and a toilet,” Smith stated.
Smith stated that the info and the legislation supported a prosecution, and that he made choices not based mostly on politics, however the info and the legislation.
“Our investigation developed proof past an inexpensive doubt that President Trump engaged in prison exercise. If requested whether or not to prosecute a former president based mostly on the identical info at present, I might achieve this no matter whether or not that president was a Democrat or a Republican,” he stated.
“Nobody, nobody ought to be above the legislation on this nation, and the legislation required that he be held to account. So that’s what I did,” Smith stated. “To have achieved in any other case on the info of those circumstances, would have been to shirk my duties as a prosecutor and as a public servant, of which I had no intention of doing.”
He additionally criticized what he stated was the retribution carried out by the president and his allies towards brokers and prosecutors who investigated the circumstances.
“My concern is that now we have seen the rule of legislation operate in our nation for thus lengthy that many people have come to take it as a right,” he stated. “The rule of legislation isn’t self-executing. It relies on our collective dedication to use it. It requires devoted service on behalf of others, particularly when that service is troublesome and comes with prices. Our willingness to pay these prices is what check and defines our dedication to the rule of legislation and to this glorious nation.”
In his opening assertion, Committee Chairman Jim Jordan blasted Smith for what he known as a partisan investigation into President Trump and different Republicans.
“Democrats have been going after President Trump for ten years, for a decade, and the nation ought to by no means, ever neglect what they did,” Jordan stated.
Jamie Raskin, the committee’s rating Democrat, stated that Smith proved that Trump “engaged in a prison scheme to overturn the outcomes of the 2020 election and to forestall the lawful switch of energy.”
“Particular counsel Smith, you pursued the info. You adopted each relevant legislation, ethics rule and DOJ regulation. Your choices had been reviewed by the general public Integrity part. You acted based mostly solely on the info. The other of Donald Trump, who now’s purporting to take over,” Raskin stated.
Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell stated that Republicans on the dais “are a joke.”
Former Justice Division particular counsel Jack Smith stands earlier than the Home Judiciary Committee earlier than a listening to about his investigations into President Donald Trump, Jan. 22, 2026 on the Capitol in Washington.
Mark Schiefelbein/AP
“They’re improper. Historical past will harshly choose them,” he stated.
Trump’s Thursday look marks Smith’s second time earlier than the committee, after he appeared behind closed doorways final month. It’s customary for former particular counsels to seem earlier than Congress publicly to debate their findings.
In his closed-door testimony, Smith defended his choice to twice carry fees towards Trump — telling lawmakers his staff “had proof past affordable doubt in each circumstances” that Trump was responsible of the fees within the 2020 election interference and categorized paperwork circumstances, in response to a transcript of the listening to.
And Smith fervently denied that there was any political affect behind his choice — opposite to allegations of Republicans on the Judiciary Committee, who requested the testimony — corresponding to strain from then-President Joe Biden or then-Lawyer Basic Merrick Garland, the transcripts reveals.
On this Dec. 17, 2025, file picture, former Division of Justice Particular Counsel Jack Smith departs on the finish of a Republican-led deposition earlier than the Home Judiciary Committee as a part of its oversight into DOJ investigations into President Donald Trump, on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C.
J. Scott Applewhite/AP, FILE
“No,” Smith responded repeatedly to these allegations, in response to the transcript.
Simply over an hour earlier than his testimony on Dec. 17, the Division of Justice despatched an e mail to Smith’s attorneys stopping him from discussing the categorized paperwork case, in response to the 255-page transcript of the deposition, launched final 12 months by the Judiciary Committee together with a video of the listening to.
This meant Smith was unable to reply most questions on that case and the deposition — supposed to ask questions concerning the alleged weaponization of the DOJ towards Trump and his allies — primarily targeted on the 2020 election case as a substitute.
His staff additionally stated Smith will adjust to U.S. District Decide Aileen Cannon’s order that blocked the discharge of the second quantity of his report coping with the categorized paperwork case.
Smith’s counsel stated the DOJ additionally refused to ship a lawyer to advise Smith on whether or not his statements had been in keeping with their dedication of what he may or couldn’t say concerning the circumstances, in response to the deposition. Smith did say, nonetheless, that Trump “tried to impede justice” within the categorized paperwork investigation “to hide his continued retention of these paperwork.
