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Conservative critics are accusing former special counsel Jack Smith of improperly coordinating with two federal judges after Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, released documents Tuesday showing Smith’s team interacted with the pair during the Trump investigations.
“Democrat DC U.S. district judges illegally worked in secret with Biden Special Counsel Jack Smith to bring charges against President Trump,” Article III Project founder Mike Davis claimed on X as details of the documents emerged on Tuesday.
Smith’s investigations led to criminal charges against President Donald Trump over the 2020 election and alleged retention of classified documents. Trump called the investigations a “witch hunt,” while Republicans widely condemned the charges as an abuse of power designed to take out the leading Republican presidential candidate.
The documents released by Grassley included notes about a briefing Smith’s team gave Attorney General Merrick Garland on Jan. 13, 2023, just after Garland appointed Smith as special counsel. The notes referenced meetings with Judges Beryl Howell and James Boasberg of Washington, D.C., both Obama appointees and Trump nemeses known for their high-profile adverse rulings against the president.
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“She liked our approach of pursuing the executive privilege litigation in an omnibus fashion,” Smith’s team wrote in reference to Howell, according to the documents. Omnibus motions allow for consolidated, rather than piecemeal, litigation and are typically used by lawyers to streamline court filings. Smith’s team frequently sought permission from the court to pierce executive privilege, a presumptive right that a president and his aides have that gives their communications a layer of legal privacy.
The briefing notes referenced a forthcoming meeting with Boasberg on March 18, 2023, the day after he was set to become chief judge, succeeding Howell.
Cruz’s office told Fox News Digital the senator thought the meetings with the judges were significant. The remark came after Cruz led a Senate hearing on the Trump cases on Tuesday during which he declared Smith’s work a “modern Watergate” scandal that was expansive and hyper-political, sweeping up personal information, such as phone records, belonging to hundreds of Republican entities and individuals.
A Republican congressional investigator told Fox News Digital the meetings with the judges merited further scrutiny.
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Smith’s team wrote in the briefing notes for Garland that Howell was aware that an omnibus executive privilege motion was coming “and loves the idea.” Smith’s team listed out nearly a dozen former Trump officials, such as Mark Meadows and Ken Cuccinelli, who would be included in the consolidated motion. The notes referenced five other, separate executive privilege motions that were already making their way through the court process, signaling that an omnibus motion would be a reduction in paperwork for the court.
The briefing notes also mentioned recent meetings between the special counsel’s team and top FBI officials. The FBI “has been very responsive,” Smith’s team wrote. The team mentioned “precedent-setting issues we face in areas of executive privilege [and] Speech or Debate,” a possible reference to Smith testing the separation of powers by seeking the potentially privileged material from those in Trump’s orbit.
Independent journalist Julie Kelly, an outspoken critic of the Biden DOJ, observed on X that Smith’s team interacted with the judges. Kelly suggested the judges were “in cahoots with Biden DOJ to rubber stamp, even advise, any strategy set forth by Jack Smith.”
Attorney Bill Shipley, a longtime federal prosecutor who represented dozens of Jan. 6 defendants, wrote on X that he did not find much about the memo “noteworthy,” saying it was “clearly” designed to bring Garland up to speed following the holidays and Smith’s new appointment. Shipley also noted how Howell and Boasberg were chief judges, meaning any grand jury matters were required to go through their offices.
Shipley noted, however, that he felt Howell notoriously ruled against the Trump administration and that her eager approval of an omnibus motion represented a desire for her to make decisions before her tenure as chief judge expired in March 2023.
“What troubles me in the text of the memo is the suggestion — which was borne out by events that followed — that Judge Howell desired to resolve all the issues involving witness privilege before she stepped down as Chief Judge,” Shipley wrote, though he noted that her decisions were appealable.
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Smith has repeatedly stood by his work, testifying to Congress that it was aligned with DOJ policies and nonpartisan.
A Smith representative declined to comment on the latest document release.
Howell’s and Boasberg’s chambers did not respond to requests for comment.
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