By admin 
Special counsel Jack Smith, who brought two indictments against now-President Donald Trump in 2023, testified in front of Congress again on Tuesday — this time, to the Senate Judiciary Committee.
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Smith’s testimony comes as Republicans continue to probe the investigations into Trump and as some in the party, including the president, have pushed for often-unspecified criminal charges to be brought against Smith.
Here are the major takeaways from Tuesday’s hearing.
An embarrassing episode epitomizes the GOP’s failures to pin down Smith
Republicans have struggled mightily to substantiate Trump’s desire for Smith to be charged criminally. But rarely has it seemed to backfire like it did Tuesday.
Sen. Eric Schmitt of Missouri crafted an apparent conspiracy theory about Smith being tied to the prosecution of Trump in Fulton County, Georgia. To substantiate his theory, Schmitt cited text messages he suggested showed Smith had been at an Atlanta Hawks game on February 3, 2024 – the day after Fulton County prosecutor Fani Willis and special prosecutor Nathan Wade admitted to an affair.
Smith appeared dumbfounded, though. He denied going to a Hawks game and said he had no recollection of even being in Atlanta.
“What would you say if I had a series of text messages from your team that said you were in Atlanta at a Warriors-Hawks game on February 3, 2024 – the day after Willis and Wade announced their affair?” Schmitt said.
Schmitt went big on the allegation, telling Smith, “I don’t think you know that we have this stuff.” He urged Smith not to “perjure yourself.” He later called Smith a “dirtbag.” He later told the “Charlie Kirk Show” that he was just asking questions and seeing whether Smith would ensnare himself.
Eventually, Democrats got Schmitt to allow Smith to actually review the evidence – a poster featuring the texts in question. In one of them, a fellow prosecutor asks about a seat being reserved for Smith. The poster showed the Atlanta Hawks’ arena.
But by this point, Smith seemed to put it together. He said he was not at a game featuring the Atlanta Hawks, but rather the University of Iowa Hawkeyes women’s basketball team – which then featured Caitlin Clark – at the University of Maryland in the Washington, DC, area.
Smith’s recollection matches up with a game played that day.
Behind the scenes, a source familiar with how Schmitt got it wrong told CNN the Republican senator checked what men’s college and NBA games were scheduled that day and found only the Atlanta Hawks set to play — but he failed to consider that Smith may have been at a women’s basketball game.
Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, after clearing up the matter, said Schmitt should apologize.
Instead, he laughed it off, telling CNN later Tuesday: “Who knew Jack Smith was a Caitlin Clark fan?”
The Republican defended his pointed line of questioning, saying, “That’s what these hearings are for. You ask questions, you get answers. You know, Jack Smith has perjured himself before, but if he says he’s at the game, maybe he’s a Caitlin Clark fan. We’ll accept that.”
At the hearing, he maintained that the texts “could have obviously been related to the prosecution” in Fulton County. He said he stood by calling Smith a “dirtbag.”
The scene epitomized how speculative and thinly constructed the GOP’s allegations about Smith, Trump’s foes and about the justice system being weaponized against Trump have been. Likewise, the GOP’s other major perjury allegation against Smith rests on a complete misreading of the evidence.
But rarely has this apparent fishing expedition been laid so bare. Schmitt seemed to firmly believe he had nailed Smith on something. But just minutes later, it seemed to fall apart – and rather spectacularly so.
Smith was more animated than at an earlier hearing
Smith is a very careful witness. He often pauses noticeably before answering a question — in a way that can be a little jarring.
But he’s also made clear that he wants to fight back against the Trump administration’s weaponization of the justice system against people like him. And on Tuesday, he was a little more animated and open.
He punctuated his opening statement by saying, “Fear may be contagious; courage is as well.”
He also called it an “outrage” that people he worked with were “targeted illegally, lost their jobs illegally, and had their lives turned upside down by this Department of Justice.”
When asked about the Supreme Court’s 2024 ruling conferring presidents with a large degree of immunity, Smith said it “can be very dangerous for the rule of law” for powerful people to benefit from such exceptions.
He also jousted with lawmakers a little more than he did before, rather than dryly reciting facts.
When GOP Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas asked him whether he had any regrets, Smith said he regretted that “the people I worked with have been unfairly fired and vilified.”
When Republican Sen. Darline Graham of South Carolina claimed Smith unfairly targeted the phone records of her late brother, Sen. Lindsey Graham, Smith told her that Lindsey Graham had investigated Trump’s underlying voter-fraud claims and found them to be false.
And he said he won’t be going away quietly.
“I will not be silenced by the continued threats of prosecution from the president or others,” Smith said.
Smith discloses that Lindsey Graham was ‘likely’ a witness
That exchange with Darline Graham was also significant when it comes to learning something new about the attempted prosecutions of Trump.
The reason: Smith said Lindsey Graham was likely to be a witness in the case.
“I believe your brother was a patriotic public servant,” Smith said. “He was not a target of our investigation. In fact, he likely would have been a witness in our case. Your brother investigated the claims that Donald Trump was making. He found them to be false.”
Lindsey Graham publicly broke with Trump on the Senate floor after January 6 (i.e. “count me out”) and appeared to be initially helpful to investigators probing the situation.
He later reconciled with Trump and assailed Smith’s investigation when he was among those whose phone records were wrapped up in the probe — and even pushed to get a financial payout for it.
Smith’s comments suggest Graham could have played at least some role in proving the charges against Trump.
Smith repeatedly defended his staff who were later fired
The former special counsel seemed to make a point to repeatedly vouch for members of his former staff who were fired by Trump’s Justice Department and, in some cases, were repeatedly invoked by name at Tuesday’s hearing.
Smith even called them “heroes.”
“My view: These people are heroes, and I believe our country does not recognize and pay enough attention to people like that,” he said. “I think if we did, the partisan things that we’re discussing today – a lot of that would go away.”
Smith also warned about what ousting people like that would portend for the country.
“If you drive those people out of public service, the institutions we rely on for justice, for protecting our country — those institutions are weakened,” Smith said.
When Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff of California talked about how Smith had been attacked, Smith said it was “much more important that the public servants who I work with – that we stop vilifying public servants.”
The GOP’s effort to target Smith appears to be losing steam
It’s been nearly a year since Trump appeared alongside then-Attorney General Pam Bondi and claimed Smith had committed crimes.
“Hopefully the Attorney General is looking at what he’s done,” Trump added eight months ago on social media.
There’s been little since then to suggest the Trump administration is able to provide him what he wants. And Tuesday’s hearing often felt like going through the motions more so than anything else.
Apart from Schmitt’s attempt at a gotcha, other Republican lawmakers generally mined territory already covered in the January House Judiciary Committee hearing.
Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri and others repeated an allegation from months ago that Smith perjured himself with his denials about seeking the contents of lawmakers’ communications. But Smith pointed to the holes in that previously debunked theory.
Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana at one point tried to suggest that Smith might have lobbied to become special counsel — the implication being that he had a political agenda and was targeting Trump — but when Smith denied it, Kennedy moved on.
Smith said he kept subpoenas secret out of fear that Trump would obstruct
Smith also told lawmakers that he sought to keep secret the phone and other records he was seeking because of concerns that Trump and his allies would try to obstruct justice.
When lawmakers suggested that Smith was implying with the nondisclosure requests that they couldn’t be trusted not to destroy evidence, Smith said it was actually Trump he was worried about.
“Our nondisclosure orders were not predicated on the idea that members of Congress or members of this committee would commit acts of obstruction,” Smith said. “It was based on a real concern that Donald Trump and his associates would do that because they had done it, and they did it again.”
Smith cited the fact that the charges against Trump included obstruction of justice and also how Trump had at one point suggested the death penalty for a known witness, former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Mark Milley.
“We had an absolute basis to seek protection of our investigation from that sort of obstruction,” Smith added.
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This story has been updated with additional details.
CNN’s Lauren Fox and Ellis Kim contributed to this story.