This morning at 9 a.m., a man Donald Trump has spent two years trying to destroy will raise his right hand at a Senate hearing that’s designed to persecute him. And he asked to be there.
The hearing is titled “Oversight of Jack Smith’s Abuse of Authority and the Targeting of Republicans and Related Matters.” Clearly Senator Chuck Grassley’s staff didn’t craft that title to invite testimony in search of answer. They wrote it to set a trap for Smith.
Republicans on the panel will spend hours trying to catch the former prosecutor in the smallest slip-up under oath, because Representative Jim Jordan has already referred him to the Justice Department for supposedly lying at his last congressional appearance. One wrong word today could become a second referral, or an indictment, and MAGA Republicans are eager to please Trump by delivering the head of an adversary on a platter.
Smith knows this, and he’s testifying anyway. According to his prepared remarks, he’ll tell senators he “will not be silenced by the continued threats of prosecution from the president or others.”
I don’t know Jack Smith personally. But I think I know something about the conversations he and his wife Katy have had, because Hannah and I have had them, too. I suspect they sat at the kitchen table and read the death threats, the graphic ones that describe what someone plans to do to your family. I imagine they asked each other whether any of it was worth it. They probably fielded calls from parents and siblings urging them to keep their heads down during the second Trump administration. And I suspect they wrestled with the pressure to stay silent while someone tries to ruin you for having done your job.
For a while, Smith laid low.
Indeed, Smith said almost nothing publicly for the better part of a year after Trump returned to office. Meanwhile, Trump was firing off orders to investigate his critics without a shred of evidence. His Justice Department indicted Jim Comey. It indicted Letitia James. It stripped security clearances from John Brennan and dozens of others. The administration announced it would pull the clearances of Smith’s own lawyers, and it sicced a federal watchdog agency on Smith for the crime of prosecuting a crime.
I’ve spoken to so many people in this situation now (more than anyone except maybe the lawyers who represent them). The pressure is extraordinary. Trump has years left in office and can bring financial ruin to just about anyone he chooses. So a lot of people have made a quiet calculation. They’ve just stopped talking. They’ve self-censored. And every time one of them goes silent, it teaches Trump that the intimidation works.
Jack Smith decided not to keep his mouth shut.
Of everyone who has stood up to this president lately, Smith has probably faced the most menacing threats of retribution. Trump badly wants to destroy the man who prosecuted him. Smith could have taken these attacks quietly, retreated into private life, and let his lawyers handle it. Nobody would’ve blamed him.
Instead, he asked to testify. That’s right. He wrote to Congress nearly a year ago requesting a public hearing — under oath — demanding to speak the truth about the investigations into Trump while the president spewed lies. That caught Republicans off guard. They’ve stalled for months, holding hearings about Jack Smith without Jack Smith present, as if they’re trying to gather the ammunition to face an opponent who is clearly confident in the firepower of truth.
Now that he’s finally in the chair, he’ll get the chance to defend his own conduct. But he’ll apparently go further. Smith is set to tell senators his investigation found proof beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump committed crimes and that he would bring the same case against a Democrat on the same facts. He also plans to outline why he believes the rule of law is under siege in the United States of America.
That’s the crucial part here. Smith is defending himself, to be sure. But he’s also defending the idea that no one is above the law at a moment when the man in the White House is trying assiduously to prove otherwise.
Courage is choosing to do what’s right over what’s easy. Smith has evidently weighed the consequences of staying silent and doesn’t like what he sees for our nation’s future if people like him self-censor. And he’s not waiting around for the enemies of the rule of law to strike at him. He wrote to Congress and said: bring it on.
I hope you get a chance to watch today. When the senators start sneering at a man whose integrity they fear, remember that Jack Smith is doing this for all of us. For you. And we owe him our thanks.
Your friend, in defiance,
DEFIANCE DAILY
In case you missed it, last night’s episode of DEFIANCE Daily is below. Catch our next episode tonight at 5 pm ET!
TRACK THE TRUMP-EPSTEIN READING ROOM & BOOKMOBILE
The Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey Epstein Memorial Bookmobile visited Parma, Ohio, yesterday. Among the 180+ visitors was U.S. congressional candidate for Ohio’s 7th District Brian Poindexter, who left behind a special message to Epstein’s survivors. The Bookmobile is back on the road, heading to Pennsylvania next.
Plan a visit and share with others. Check out the tour schedule HERE.
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