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After the Department of Justice announced via a court filing that Attorney General Merrick Garland intends to release Jack Smith’s report on the Trump 1/6 case but not the classified documents case due to ongoing criminal cases involving Trump’s co-defendants, Democrats on the House Oversight Committee have informed the DOJ that they want both volumes of Smith’s report.
Oversight Committee Ranking Member Gerry Connolly (D-VA) wrote to Garland:
I write to request that the Department of Justice (DOJ) immediately provide the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform (the Committee) with a complete copy of Volume Two of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s final report on the mishandling of classified documents by President Donald Trump and associates for review, in camera.
On January 8, 2025, in a filing before the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, DOJ indicated that Volume Two of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s final report would not be made public so long as certain criminal proceedings remain pending. 1 As detailed in the filing, Volume Two of the final report relates to the Special Counsel’s investigation of the mishandling of classified documents by President Donald Trump and associates.2 Instead of a public release, DOJ outlined its intent to provide a version of Volume Two “to the Chairmen and Ranking Members of the House and Senate Judiciary Committees for review in camera upon their request and agreement prohibiting any public release of the Final Report’s contents.” Given the jurisdiction and role of this Committee, similar access to Volume Two must be afforded to the Committee.
…
In light of the Committee’s legislative jurisdiction over presidential records, broad investigative jurisdiction, and vested interest in this matter, I urge DOJ to make available Volume Two of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s final report to the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform for review in camera immediately or no later than January 15, 2025.
Connolly referred to House Rule X, which designates the Oversight Committee as the principal committee for oversight in the House, as his reasoning for why his committee should have access to the report.
Again, the DOJ is not allowing the public release of any of the report’s findings because that would give immediate grounds for the ongoing criminal cases to be dismissed.
However, the letter does signal that House Oversight Democrats plan on doing their own investigation into Trump’s handling of classified documents, and they will use the Smith report as their roadmap, whether they can publicly disclose the report’s contents or not.
The classified documents volume of Smith’s report will likely become public, especially if it looks like Trump is going to move to have his DOJ dismiss the cases against his co-defendants. There is also the possibility that Trump pulls a Michael Cohen on his employees and has them take the fall for the theft and refusal to turn over the classified documents.
Either way, Democrats are going to get the information in Smith’s report, and it looks like Democrats will make sure that Trump’s alleged crimes aren’t going away.
What do you think about Democrats getting volume two of Jack Smith’s report? Share your opinion in the comments below.