The ghosts of January 6 Capitol rioting came back to haunt former US President Donald Trump on Saturday. The US Department of Justice appointed Jack Smith, a war-crimes specialist, to investigate Trump’s role in January 6 rioting on the Capitol and his handling of sensitive government documents at his Florida residence. The development comes less than 72 hours after Donald Trump announced his bid for White House in 2024. Trump clarified that he has not done ‘anything wrong’ and that it’s a ‘political witch-hunt’ against him.
The US Attorney General Merrick Garland, while announcing Jack Smith’s appointment as special counsel for the above two cases involving Donald Trump, said that the “investigations will mover forward expeditiously”.
Why a Special Counsel is appointed?
A Special Counsel is appointed by the US Department of Justice to investigate politically sensitive cases. Special Counsels are expected do their jobs with a degree of independence from the Justice Department leadership, who may be perceived to be partisan by the parties under investigation.
Jack Smith until recently served as the chief prosecutor for the International Court of Justice in The Hague. He was tasked with prosecuting war crimes in Kosovo. He previously oversaw the Justice Department’s public integrity section and worked as a federal and state prosecutor in New York.
This marks the second time in five years that the Justice Department has appointed a special counsel to probe Trump’s conduct.
‘I have done nothing wrong’: Donald Trump
Donald Trump hit out at the Department of Justice following the appointment of Special Counsel Jack Smith. “I have done nothing wrong,” he said. “These people are corrupt and they go behind honest and innocent people in the guise of legitimacy. I have given million and million of pages and they got nothing,” Trump said in a statement. “Document row is a total hoax. I have done all the proper things. It’s a political witch hunt.”
In August this year, FBI agents seized thousands of government records, some marked as highly classified, from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home during a court-approved search. Investigators also are examining Trump for possible obstruction of the probe.
The other investigation is a sprawling probe into an alleged plot by Trump’s allies to overturn the 2020 presidential election by submitting batches of phony slates of electors to the US National Archives. It has been alleged that Trump’s allies tried to block the US Congress from certifying Biden’s election victory.
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