00:00Former special counsel Jack Smith went straight into the blast furnace on Capitol Hill Thursday and did not blink.
00:09Smith, who twice indicted Donald Trump before both cases were dropped after Trump won re-election,
00:15defended his investigations in a tense, combative, and deeply partisan House hearing, his first public testimony before Congress.
00:22He opened with this.
00:24I made my decisions without regard to President Trump's political association, activities, beliefs, or candidacy in the 2024 election.
00:37President Trump was charged because the evidence established that he willfully broke the law, the very laws he took an oath to uphold.
00:47Republicans framed Smith as a rogue prosecutor who tried to take down Trump for political reasons.
00:53Democrats view him as a public servant who did exactly what the law required.
00:58At one point, Democratic congresswoman Pramila Jayapal walked Smith through what his investigation actually found.
01:05My Republican colleagues keep trying to rewrite history.
01:08They claim that somehow Trump's words and actions did not legally rise to the level of criminal activity,
01:14that he did not directly cause violence at the Capitol.
01:18And so I want to set that record straight with you right now.
01:20First of all, you successfully secured indictments against Donald Trump in two major federal cases,
01:27election interference in the 2020 election and mishandling of classified documents after leaving office.
01:33Is that correct?
01:34Yes.
01:36And you've been a federal prosecutor for nearly 30 years.
01:39You led this investigation, combing through hundreds of thousands of documents, photos, videos, and communication.
01:47Did your investigation find that Donald Trump attempted to manufacture fraudulent state slates of presidential electors in seven states that he lost?
01:59Yes.
02:00Did he pressure state officials to ignore true vote counts in those states?
02:08Yes.
02:08Did he spread lies and conspiracies to his followers to make them believe that the election had been illegally rigged against him?
02:18Yes.
02:19Did he pressure DOJ officials to stop the certification of the election?
02:25He did.
02:26Republicans zeroed in on tactics they say crossed the line, including subpoenas for phone records tied to GOP lawmakers.
02:34Smith pushed back, saying his office needed those logs because Trump was actively trying to reach members of Congress as he worked to delay the certification of the 2020 election on January 6th.
02:46Then came the question Republicans were clearly waiting for.
02:49Did he make mistakes?
02:50So, Mr. Smith, looking at the record, I see that you were reversed and rebuked by the Department of Justice itself, by the Attorney General, by the Solicitor General, by multiple district court justices, judges, by the Court of Appeals, and by the U.S. Supreme Court itself.
03:04So my final question is, do you believe that you made any mistakes?
03:07Do you have any regrets as to how you conducted this investigation?
03:10If I have any regret, it would be not expressing enough appreciation for my staff who work so hard in these investigations.
03:21We follow the facts and the law of these people who work for me, sacrificed endlessly, and have endured way too much for just doing their job.
03:30So if anything, I wish that I had thanked them.
03:32I'm the gentleman here.
03:33No mistakes.
03:34There's that humility.
03:34Mr. Chair, I yield back.
03:36Democrats closed ranks around Smith.
03:38My Republican colleagues are a joke.
03:41They're wrong.
03:42History will harshly judge them.
03:44So I want you to lean in today.
03:46You have nothing to be ashamed of.
03:48You did everything right, sir.
03:49As Smith was testifying, Donald Trump posted this on Truth Social, calling him, quote, a deranged animal, accusing Jack Smith of destroying lives and suggesting Attorney General Pam Bondi should go after him.
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