Special counsel, Jack Smith, has been given a “blank check” to conduct a witch hunt against Donald Trump, the former president’s lawyer has complained to a court.
In a filing for Trump’s classified documents case in Florida, Christopher Kise alleges Smith has been given unlimited resources, while other parts of the Department of Justice have been starved of funding.
Smith is prosecuting Trump there for alleged hoarding of classified documents and in Washington, D.C. for alleged interference in the 2020 presidential election.
“To be clear, offering the Special Counsel a blank check has harmed President Trump’s substantial rights, and DOJ [Department of Justice] simply could not have funded the entirety of Jack Smith’s expansive politically motivated witch hunt from an alternative source,” Kise complained to Judge Aileen Cannon in the filing on Monday.
Trump is facing 40 federal charges over his handling of sensitive materials retrieved from his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, after leaving the White House in January 2021. He is accused of obstructing efforts by federal authorities to return them. Trump, who is almost certain to be the Republican candidate in the 2024 presidential election, has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
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The former president was also indicted on four counts in Washington D.C. for allegedly working to overturn the results of the 2020 election in the run-up to the January 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol. Trump has pleaded not guilty to the charges, including conspiracy to defraud the U.S. government and conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding.
Newsweek sought email comment from Kise and from Smith’s office on Tuesday.
“The Special Counsel’s Office is pursuing two different cases in two jurisdictions in order to maximize interference in the ongoing presidential election. This tactic is the luxury of a prosecutor facing no resource constraints,” Kise wrote.
A lack of funding killed off a Department of Justice investigation of Apple, he added in the filing. Smith’s actions amounted to election interference in the 2024 presidential race, he said.
“Resource constraints on prosecutors have been regarded as an indispensable guarantee of substantive fairness,” Kise wrote. “The lack of any such constraints here has allowed the Special Counsel’s Office to engage in an unabashed political crusade with zero accountability.”
Kise said that, in contrast to the unlimited funding on the Trump case, other parts of the Department of Justice have been denied funding. “In 2019, for example, DOJ was forced to prioritize its antitrust review of Google over Apple because it could not afford to pursue both,” he wrote.
It was part of his overall argument that Smith’s appointment as special counsel violated the Appropriations Clause of the U.S. constitution.
The Appropriations Clause states that “no Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law; and a regular Statement and Account of the Receipts and Expenditures of all public money shall be published from time to time.”
In his filings, Kise argued that there is no set legislation to allow for Smith’s unlimited spending as special counsel.
Uncommon Knowledge
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.