House Republicans are demanding testimony from former Special Counsel Jack Smith regarding his investigation into Donald Trump.
Smith was appointed to look into Trump’s mishandling of classified information and his role in the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan sent a letter to Smith on Wednesday demanding his testimony as part of the committee’s own investigation into the prosecution of Trump.
“Due to your service as Special Counsel, the Committee believes that you possess information that is vital to its oversight of this matter,” Jordan wrote.
He said based on communications with Smith’s lawyer, he believed Smith was available to testify at a deposition on December 17.
“Accordingly, please find enclosed a testimonial subpoena for a deposition at 10:00 a.m. on December 17, 2025, and a document subpoena for the requested materials to be produced to the Committee by December 12, 2025,” he wrote.
When asked about Smith testifying behind closed doors, Trump said on Wednesday that he would prefer a public hearing. He went on to attack the former special counsel as a “thug.”
But it comes as Trump is fighting to keep Smith’s final report on his mishandling of classified documents from going public.
The report had been submitted just before Trump took office for a second term.
In a court filing on Tuesday, the president urged Judge Aileen Cannon, whom he appointed, to extend the order blocking the Justice Department from releasing the report.
It argued that doing so would “perpetuate Jack Smith’s unlawful criminal investigations and proceedings.”
In its own filing on Monday, the Justice Department also said that the order should remain in effect. It also argued that, should the court allow the report to be released, the Justice Department should be required to give Trump’s co-defendants 60 days’ notice.
The move to keep the report private is an unusual move after a special counsel investigation. Typically, the report is transmitted to Congress and released.
Last month, a panel of judges on an appeals court slammed Cannon for her “undue delay” in making a decision and gave her sixty days to act. It expires in January.
Democrats on Capitol Hill were not happy on Wednesday that the Republicans were demanding to hear from Smith behind closed doors.
“Chairman Jordan has denied Special Counsel Jack Smith’s offer to speak publicly to the whole Congress and the whole country about his investigations into Donald Trump, instead demanding he comply with a subpoena for a closed-door, private session simply so Republicans can spin, distort, and cherry-pick his remarks through press leaks,” said House Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Jamie Raskin in a statement.
Raskin questioned why his GOP colleagues were so afraid of Americans hearing from Smith directly.
“Judiciary Committee Republicans want to force the Special Counsel into the shadows of a backroom interrogation and subject him to the tiresome and loathsome partisan tactics of leak-and-distort, when the American public is demanding transparency and a public hearing,” he said.
The post House GOP Shuts Down Public Testimony of Nemesis Trump Wants Silenced appeared first on The Daily Beast.
