House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, is accusing former special counsel Jack Smith and the former Biden administration of trying to "sway" the 2024 election with the Department of Justice (DOJ) probe into President Donald Trump and his allies. Jordan's committee is releasing a new 57-page report arguing that Smith and his team "ran roughshod over key constitutional protections" and that the former Democratic White House used "the DOJ as a weapon against its political opponents." "The Special Counsel’s prosecutors tried to silence President Trump with unlawful gag orders, threatened defense attorneys, mishandled key documents, and broke protocol to release a massive trove of alleged evidence just weeks before the presidential election to sway public opinion," the report said. As many as 44 members of Congress in both the House and Senate had the contents of their text messages gathered by Smith's team, Republicans have said.
BIDEN SPECIAL COUNSEL’S 'RUNAWAY TRAIN’ SCOOPED UP SENSITIVE LAWMAKER INFO: 'ABUSE OF POWER' Jordan's report accused the prosecutors of willfully skirting legal processes to get that information in a bid to hide their intelligence gathering. JACK SMITH THRUST BACK INTO SPOTLIGHT AT BLANCHE HEARING OVER EXPOSED SENATORS’ MESSAGES "Internal documents show that Arctic Frost investigators, and later Smith’s team, had only limited, perfunctory discussions with subject-matter experts in DOJ’s Public Integrity Section (PIN) about the constitutionality of these seizures," the report said. "Although PIN cautioned that the subpoenas could be unconstitutional, PIN approved them nonetheless, asserting there was little 'litigation risk' because the gag orders that accompanied the subpoenas would prevent Members from ever discovering the seizures.
As a result, Members of Congress were unaware of the Biden-Harris DOJ’s spying for more than two years." The report said investigators in the probe, colloquially known as "Arctic Frost," sought Jordan's own phone records from the period between August 2020 and January 2021 in relation to the federal probe into Rep. VETERAN DEM BREAKS PARTY LINE AS JACK SMITH SPYING SCANDAL GRIPS CAPITOL HILL PIN said lawmakers' constitutional protections under the Speech or Debate Clause did not apply "because the subpoena targeted his personal cell phone accounts, and because the subpoenas were served to a third party," i.e., Jordan's phone carrier rather than Jordan himself. An email excerpt showed PIN Deputy Chief Jennifer Clarke noted there was a "litigation risk" with the argument but "approved the subpoenas nonetheless," the report said.
A separate email excerpt in the report showed another PIN official, John Keller, also said there was a "litigation risk" in obtaining members of Congress' toll records but noted it would be "minimal" due to the low likelihood of those lawmakers facing federal charges. JACK SMITH HIT WITH CRIMINAL REFERRAL AS GOP MOVES TESTIMONY FIGHT TOWARD PROSECUTION Keller's email also noted the government had a "potentially meritorious argument that the calls over the relevant period — especially unsolicited incoming calls — would not constitute protected legislative acts." The report also alleged that the DOJ ran afoul of its own rules by improperly using an independent watchdog office to serve Jordan's phone carrier when it significantly expanded what information it needed about him. "On May 1, the DOJ issued a subpoena for Chairman Jordan’s phone records from January 1, 2020, to April 25, 2022—every call incoming and outgoing for more than two years.43 A Special Agent from the DOJ Office of the Inspector General (OIG)—an entity that should be independent of the DOJ and maintain a reporting relationship with Congress as it investigates waste, fraud, and abuse—served the subpoena to Chairman Jordan’s phone carrier," the report said.
OIG Special Agent Brian Burnett testified to the committee that the investigation as a whole was "unique" within his three decades of law enforcement experience in that he was following orders from an assistant U.S. attorney rather than investigating himself, the report alleged. "A normal investigation would be, I would do the investigation, become familiar with everything, you know, do grand jury subpoenas, do the normal investigative process, follow the normal investigative steps. But, in this case, those steps were given to us by the prosecution team," an excerpt from Burnett's testimony showed.
MIKE DAVIS: WHY CRIMINAL REFERRAL OF JACK SMITH WAS 100% JUSTIFIED Jordan's report also noted that Smith's team backed down from grand jury subpoenas sent to AT&T for two other lawmakers' phone records after the phone carrier questioned their legal basis. TRUMP DOJ WITHDRAWS SUBPOENAS TARGETING NEW YORK TIMES JOURNALISTS AMID LEAK PROBE "In May 2023, Special Counsel Smith sent AT&T a grand jury subpoena that included a request for phone records associated with AT&T accounts for two other members of Congress. However, when AT&T raised questions with ...
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