WASHINGTON (AP) — Former Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith told lawmakers in a closed-door interview on Wednesday that his team of investigators “developed proof beyond a reasonable doubt” that President Donald Trump had criminally conspired to overturn the results of the 2020 election, according to portions of his opening statement obtained by The Associated Press.
He also said investigators had accrued “powerful evidence” that Trump broke the law by hoarding classified documents from his first term as president at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, and by obstructing government efforts to recover the records.
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Former Department of Justice Special Counsel Jack Smith arrives under subpoena for a House Judiciary Committee deposition as part of its oversight into DOJ investigations into President Donald Trump, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Former Department of Justice Special Counsel Jack Smith, center, and his attorney Lanny Breuer arrive for a closed-door interview with House Republicans at Capitol Hill, Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Former Department of Justice Special Counsel Jack Smith arrives for a closed-door interview with House Republicans at Capitol Hill, Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Former Department of Justice Special Counsel Jack Smith, left, and his attorney Lanny Breuer arrive for a closed-door interview with House Republicans at Capitol Hill, Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Former Department of Justice Special Counsel Jack Smith arrives under subpoena for a House Judiciary Committee deposition as part of its oversight into DOJ investigations into President Donald Trump, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
FILE - Special counsel Jack Smith speaks about an indictment of President Donald Trump, Aug. 1, 2023, at a Department of Justice office in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)
“I made my decisions in the investigation without regard to President Trump’s political association, activities, beliefs, or candidacy in the 2024 election,” Smith said. “We took actions based on what the facts and the law required — the very lesson I learned early in my career as a prosecutor.”
He said that if asked whether he would “prosecute a former president based on the same facts today, I would do so regardless of whether the president was a Republican or Democrat.”
The private deposition before the House Judiciary Committee gives Smith his first chance to face questions, albeit behind closed doors, about a pair of investigations into Trump that resulted in since-abandoned criminal charges between the Republican president’s first and second terms in office. Smith was subpoenaed earlier this month to provide both testimony and documents as part of a Republican investigation into the Trump probes during the Biden administration.
The former special counsel cooperated with the congressional demand despite having volunteered more than a month earlier to answer questions publicly before the committee, an overture his lawyers say was rebuffed by Republicans.
“Testifying before this committee, Jack is showing tremendous courage in light of the remarkable and unprecedented retribution campaign against him by this administration and this White House,” one of Smith’s lawyers, Lanny Breuer, told reporters Wednesday. “Let’s be clear: Jack Smith is a career prosecutor, who conducted this investigation based on the facts and based on the law and nothing more.”
Trump told reporters at the White House that he supported the idea of an open hearing, saying: “I’d rather see him testify publicly. There’s no way he can answer the questions.”
Smith is expected to discuss both of his investigations of Trump but will not answer questions that call for grand jury materials, which are restricted by law, according to a person familiar with the investigation who insisted on anonymity to discuss the interview. He is also expected to correct what he regards as mischaracterizations from Republicans about his work, including about his team’s use of cellphone records belonging to certain GOP lawmakers, the person said.
Smith was appointed in 2022 to oversee the Justice Department investigations into Trump’s efforts to overturn his 2020 presidential election loss to Democrat Joe Biden and his hoarding of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago. Smith’s team filed charges in both investigations.
Smith abandoned the cases after Trump was elected to the White House again last year, citing Justice Department legal opinions that say a sitting president cannot be indicted.
Republicans who control Congress have sought interviews with at least some individual members of Smith’s team.
In recent weeks they have seized on revelations that the team, as part of its investigation, had analyzed the phone records of select GOP lawmakers from on and around Jan. 6, 2021, when pro-Trump rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol to try to halt the certification of Trump’s election loss to Biden. The phone records reviewed by prosecutors included details only about the incoming and outgoing phone numbers and the length of the call but not the contents of the conversation.
Follow the AP’s coverage of former special counsel Jack Smith at https://apnews.com/hub/jack-smith.
Former Department of Justice Special Counsel Jack Smith arrives under subpoena for a House Judiciary Committee deposition as part of its oversight into DOJ investigations into President Donald Trump, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Former Department of Justice Special Counsel Jack Smith, center, and his attorney Lanny Breuer arrive for a closed-door interview with House Republicans at Capitol Hill, Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Former Department of Justice Special Counsel Jack Smith arrives for a closed-door interview with House Republicans at Capitol Hill, Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Former Department of Justice Special Counsel Jack Smith, left, and his attorney Lanny Breuer arrive for a closed-door interview with House Republicans at Capitol Hill, Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Former Department of Justice Special Counsel Jack Smith arrives under subpoena for a House Judiciary Committee deposition as part of its oversight into DOJ investigations into President Donald Trump, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
FILE - Special counsel Jack Smith speaks about an indictment of President Donald Trump, Aug. 1, 2023, at a Department of Justice office in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)
Four centrist Republicans broke with Speaker Mike Johnson on Wednesday and signed onto a Democratic-led petition that will force a House vole on extending for three years an enhanced pandemic-era subsidy that lowers health insurance costs for millions of Americans.
House Republican leaders have instead pushed a GOP health care bill that does not address the soaring monthly premiums people will soon endure as the tax credits for those who buy insurance through the Affordable Care Act expire.
Trump says he will address the nation on Wednesday night: Trump announced his plans in a post on his social media site, saying he will speak live from the White House at 9 p.m. EST. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that the president will discuss what he accomplished this year, the first of his second term, and his plans for the next three years.
And the West Wing went into damage control after Trump’s understated but influential chief of staff, Susie Wiles, criticized Attorney General Pam Bondi’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein case and offered an unvarnished take on her boss and others in his orbit in interviews published Tuesday in Vanity Fair
Here’s the latest:
Four centrist Republicans broke with Speaker Mike Johnson on Wednesday and signed onto a Democratic-led petition that will force a House vole on extending for three years an enhanced pandemic-era subsidy that lowers health insurance costs for millions of Americans.
The move comes after House Republican leaders pushed ahead with a GOP health care bill that does not address the soaring monthly premiums that many Americans will soon endure as the tax credits for those who buy insurance through the Affordable Care Act expire at year’s end.
Democrats needed 218 signatures to force a floor vote on their bill, which would extend the subsides for three years. They reached the magic number with the signatures of Republican Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick, Robert Bresnahan and Ryan Mackenzie, all from Pennsylvania, and Mike Lawler of New York.
Claudia Sheinbaum called on the United Nations Wednesday to “prevent any bloodshed” as tensions rise.
Speaking in response to Trump’s comments the day before ordering a blockade of all “sanctioned oil tankers” into Venezuela, Sheinbaum criticized the U.N., saying it “has not been seen” mediating ongoing hostilities.
“We stand for non-interference, self-determination of peoples, and the peaceful resolution of disputes. We call for dialogue and peace, not intervention, in any international dispute,” she said.
Smith, the former DOJ prosecutor, declined comment as he entered the House Judiciary Committee hearing room for the briefing he had sought to make public.
“Testifying before this committee, Jack is showing tremendous courage in light of the remarkable and unprecedented retribution campaign against him by this administration and this White House,” lawyer Lanny Breuer said. “Let’s be clear: Jack Smith is a career prosecutor, who conducted this investigation based on the facts and based on the law and nothing more.”
Trump has said the proposed $85 billion deal to create the nation’s first transcontinental railroad sounds good to him. But the merger has lost the support of two unions that represent more than half their workers over concerns it will jeopardize safety and jobs, raise shipping rates and consumer prices, and cause significant disruptions.
When they officially announce their decision Wednesday, the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen and the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes Division will join the American Chemistry Council, an assortment of agricultural groups and competing railroad BNSF in raising concerns the merger would hurt competition.
The deal has the support of the nation’s largest rail union, which represents conductors and hundreds of individual shippers. The U.S. Surface Transportation Board will weigh stakeholders’ opinions to determine whether the merger is in the public interest after the railroads file their formal application, expected later this week.
The question is whether Fulton County’s Democratic district attorney will answer any of them.
The Republican-led Special Committee on Investigation has been eager to examine allegations of misconduct against Willis since she sought criminal convictions for efforts to overturn Trump’s 2020 election loss in Georgia.
Willis’ reelection campaign accused the committee of “trying to dig up dirt, slow us down, and distract Fani Willis from her job” in an email to supporters Wednesday morning. It urged people to pack the hearing room or send a donation.
“We want to make today — the day they tried to tear her down — our single biggest fundraising day of the year,” it says. “Let’s turn their political stunt into a massive show of grassroots strength.”
The Senate Commerce committee is expected to question Brendan Carr Wednesday about how he pressured broadcasters to take ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel off the air.
As chairman of the nation’s top broadcast regulator, Carr has closely aligned with Trump’s aggressive posture toward media outlets the administration views as hostile, launching Federal Communications Commission investigations into ABC, CBS and NBC News, in addition to some local stations.
ABC announced Kimmel’s suspension hours after Carr’s “We can do this the easy way or the hard way” warning. The show returned to air within a week amid bipartisan criticism.
“It is unbelievably dangerous for government to put itself in the position of saying ‘we’re going to decide what speech we like and what we don’t’,” Senate Commerce chair Ted Cruz said.
Trump isn’t alone in questioning the lack of video that might clearly identify the gunman who fatally shot two students and wounded nine others in a building at the edge of Brown University ’s campus before escaping into the surrounding neighborhood. Both authorities and community members are raising questions about campus security.
But some others say the attention on security measures does little to address the real issue.
“The issue isn’t the doors, it’s the guns,” said Zoe Kass, a senior who fled the engineering building as police stormed in Saturday. After spending of her life in schools where every door was locked and school shootings continued to persist, Kass said such security measures only created “the illusion of safety.”
In his latest commentary on the Brown University shooting that killed two students, the president suggests the campus should have had more video surveillance.
“Why did Brown University have so few Security Cameras? There can be no excuse for that. In the modern age, it just doesn’t get worse!!!” Trump posted on Truth Social.
Brown President Christina Paxson said the campus has 1,200 cameras, though none captured the shooter clearly. “I have been deeply saddened by people questioning that,” she said Tuesday. “As time goes on, there is a natural instinct to assign responsibility for tragic events like this ... but the shooter is responsible.”
Authorities released a video timeline potentially showing the shooter; they’re seeking additional footage from the public. No arrests have been made.
Trump called it “a school problem” when asked about authorities, including the FBI, not having a suspect.
House Republican leaders are determined to push ahead with a GOP health care bill that excludes efforts to address the soaring monthly premiums millions of Americans will soon endure as pandemic-era tax credits for people who buy insurance through the Affordable Care Act expire at year’s end.
Speaker Mike Johnson had discussed the prospect of allowing more politically vulnerable GOP lawmakers a chance to vote on their amendment that would temporarily extend pandemic-era subsidies for ACA coverage. But after days of private talks, leadership sided with the more conservative wing of the conference, which has assailed the subsidies as propping up a failed ACA marketplace.
The maneuvering surrounding the health care vote all but guarantees that many Americans will see substantially higher insurance costs in 2026. In the Senate, a bipartisan group was still trying to come up with a compromise to extend the subsidies, which fueled this year’s government shutdown. But senators made clear that any potential legislation would likely wait until January, after the holiday break.
▶ Read more about the GOP’s plan
Trump has said for weeks said that the U.S. will move its military pressure campaign beyond the water and start strikes on land. His announcement Tuesday night he’s ordering a naval blockade of all “sanctioned oil tankers” is ramping up pressure on Venezuela’s authoritarian leader Nicolás Maduro.
Trump accused Venezuela of using oil to fund drug trafficking and other crimes and vowed to continue military pressure. “It will only get bigger, and the shock to them will be like nothing they have ever seen before — Until such time as they return to the United States of America all of the Oil, Land, and other Assets that they previously stole from us.”
“On his social media, he assumes that Venezuela’s oil, land, and mineral wealth are his property,” Venezuela’s government responded in a statement. “Consequently, he demands that Venezuela immediately hand over all its riches. The President of the United States intends to impose, in an utterly irrational manner, a supposed naval blockade on Venezuela with the aim of stealing the wealth that belongs to our nation.”
Congress is divided over supporting or challenging the U.S. military strikes on boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific that have killed at least 95 people.
▶ Read more about the blockade
Former Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith is set for a closed-door interview with House Republicans on Wednesday after lawmakers rebuffed his offer to testify publicly about his investigations into President Trump.
The private deposition is part of an ongoing investigation by the Republican-led House Judiciary Committee into the Justice Department’s criminal inquiries of Trump during the Biden administration. Smith was subpoenaed earlier this month to provide both testimony and documents, and his lawyers indicated that he would cooperate with the congressional demand despite having volunteered more than a month earlier to answer questions publicly before the committee.
Smith is expected to discuss both of his investigations of Trump but will not answer questions that call for grand jury materials, which are restricted by law, according to a person familiar with the investigation who insisted on anonymity to discuss the interview. He is also expected to correct what he regards as mischaracterizations from Republicans about his work, including about his team’s use of cellphone records belonging to certain GOP lawmakers, the person said.
▶ Read more about the closed-door interview
Warner Bros. urged its shareholders Wednesday to reject a hostile takeover bid from Paramount Skydance, saying that a rival bid from Netflix will be better for customers.
Paramount is offering $30 per Warner share to Netflix’s $27.75. Paramount seeks control of the entire company — including cable stalwarts CNN and Discovery — while the Netflix bid, if approved by regulators and shareholders, will close only after Warner completes its previously announced separation of its cable operations.
In its appeal to shareholders, Paramount noted its offer also contains more cash than Netflix’s bid — $18 billion more — and argued that it’s more likely to pass scrutiny from the Trump administration, a big concern given his habit of injecting himself in American business decisions.
Paramount is run by David Ellison, the son of Oracle CEO and close Trump ally Larry Ellison. A private equity firm owned by Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, is no longer backing the Paramount deal, the firm confirmed Tuesday.
President Donald Trump is going to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware for a dignified transfer for the two Iowa National Guard members killed in an attack in the Syrian desert.
Trump will travel to Delaware on Wednesday. The ritual at Dover Air Force Base honors U.S. service members killed in action and is one of the most solemn duties undertaken by the commander in chief. Trump has called it “the toughest thing” he has to do as president.
FILE - Special counsel Jack Smith speaks about an indictment of President Donald Trump, Aug. 1, 2023, at a Department of Justice office in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)
President Nicolas Maduro addresses supporters during a rally marking the anniversary of the Battle of Santa Ines, which took place during Venezuela's 19th-century Federal War, in Caracas, Venezuela, Wednesday, Dec. 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)
President Donald Trump speaks during a Hanukkah reception in the East Room of the White House, Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
