THE STENCH IS GONE: Trump Responds to Lawfare Prosecutor’s Surprise Resignation
Tyler O'Neil /
President-elect Donald Trump celebrated the resignation of Jack Smith, the special counsel who oversaw two legal cases against Trump and whom a judge had ruled was improperly appointed.
“The Stench of Deranged Jack Smith and his thugs is GONE,” Trump posted on Truth Social Sunday. “They were sent packing after spending over $100,000,000, destroying the lives of many people and families, who will never be the same again.”
“Deranged Jack accomplished nothing, except to show what complete losers my political opponents are!!!” the president-elect concluded.
Trump also called Smith “a disgrace to himself, his family, and his Country.”
Smith prosecuted Trump for alleged lawbreaking in contesting the 2020 presidential election results before the Jan. 6, 2021, storming of the U.S. Capitol, and for his alleged improper retention of classified documents. The Justice Department dropped both cases after Trump won the 2024 presidential election. Prosecutors are still keeping the classified documents case alive against two of Trump’s employees, however.
Smith submitted a report to Attorney General Merrick Garland on Tuesday, and U.S. District Judge Eileen Cannon blocked the report’s release on Thursday.
The Justice Department filed a motion Saturday, urging Cannon not to grant a further delay and noting in a footnote that Smith left the department on Friday.
“The Special Counsel completed his work and submitted his final confidential report on
January 7, 2025, and separated from the Department on January 10,” the footnote reads.
In July, Cannon granted Trump’s motion to dismiss the classified documents case, ruling that when Garland nominated Smith, he violated the Constitution’s appointments clause, which states that “Officers of the United States” must be appointed by the president and confirmed by the U.S. Senate. The Justice Department appealed the case to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, which was reviewing Cannon’s dismissal order.
Former Attorney General Ed Meese and two law professors, Steven Calabresi and Gary Lawson, filed an amicus brief in December 2023 arguing that Garland lacked the power to appoint Smith for many reasons. They argued that Garland, the attorney general, has no authority to appoint a “private citizen to receive extraordinary criminal law enforcement power under the title of special counsel.”
Meese, Calabresi, and Lawson also noted that there is no statute authorizing the “attorney general, rather than the president by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to appoint… a special counsel” like Smith.
Trump’s $100 million figure appears to be an estimate of the combined prosecutions into Trump and his co-defendants. The president-elect previously posted that “Over $100 Million Dollars of Taxpayer Dollars has been wasted in the Democrat Party’s fight against their Political Opponent, ME. Nothing like this has ever happened in our Country before.”
A Newsweek analysis from November found that Smith spent $50 million.
New York Attorney General Letitia James brought a case against Trump, claiming he had violated the law by exaggerating his net worth. A judge ordered him to pay hundreds of millions.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg prosecuted Trump for falsifying business records, arguing that by allegedly misclassifying a “hush money” payment to Stephanie Clifford—better known by her porn stage name Stormy Daniels—Trump had interfered in the 2016 election. New York Justice Juan Merchan sentenced Trump on Friday, giving him no prison time and no fine, yet finalizing Trump’s conviction on the charges—at least until the president-elect appeals.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis brought a case against Trump under Georgia law for his acts contesting the 2020 presidential election. After a scandal in which Willis admitted to an affair with her subordinate, Nathan Wade, a judge disqualified her from the case and she has filed an appeal.
Critics denounce these charges as a form of “lawfare” aimed at undermining Trump’s chances in the 2024 presidential election. If so, the effort appears to have backfired, or at least failed.