Special counsel Jack Smith’s brief in the federal election subversion case “clearly contains damning allegations” against former President Donald Trump, according to Fox News legal analyst and law professor Jonathan Turley.
Turley, a professor at George Washington University Law School who often defends Trump, wrote on his personal blog in response to U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan’s Thursday order to release additional evidence ahead of the election.
Chutkan’s order follows a request from Trump’s team to block the release of Smith’s exhibits related to the lengthy brief unsealed last week that laid out prosecutors’ arguments that Trump acted as a private citizen when attempting to overturn his 2020 loss to President Joe Biden.
Trump’s team argued that “no further disclosures” of Smith’s “so-called ‘evidence’ that the Special Counsel’s Office has unlawfully cherry-picked and mischaracterized” should be unsealed. The defense repeated its argument that Smith’s brief was politically motivated, given that it was filed just weeks before voters will cast a ballot in the 2024 presidential election, for which Trump is the Republican candidate against Vice President Kamala Harris.
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Chutkan put a seven-day stay on the order, saying “the court will grant Defendant’s request for a stay so that he can ‘evaluate litigation options.'”
Newsweek has reached out to Trump’s legal team for comment via email on Friday.
Smith is leading the prosecution against Trump on four counts related to alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 election results leading up to the January 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol.
Trump is accused of conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction and attempted obstruction of an official proceeding and conspiracy against rights in connection with an alleged pressure campaign on state officials to reverse the 2020 election results.
In his Friday blog post, Turley wrote that “the brief clearly contains damning allegations, including witness accounts, for Trump.”
He added that Trump’s lawyers’ earlier “objection to the release of the brief was not a defense of any actions taken on January 6th by the former president or others, but rather an objection to what even the court admitted was an ‘irregular’ process.”
Turley argued in his post that Smith’s “unrelenting” demands for a “trial before the election” is against the Justice Department’s typical policy so close to an election. Election Day is November 5, but early voting is under way in some states.
He cited one section of the Justice Department’s manual, which says: “Federal prosecutors… may never select the timing of any action, including investigative steps, criminal charges, or statements, for the purpose of affecting any election.”
Turley further argued: “With no trial date for 2025, there is no reason why Smith or Chutkan would adopt such an irregular process. The court could have slightly delayed these filings until after the approaching election or it could have sealed the filings.”
The case has been delayed several times, notably because of the U.S. Supreme Court’s July 1 presidential immunity ruling, which required Smith to rework the government’s case to align with the decision.
