Lawmakers accuse Jack Smith of lying to Congress, call for federal probe

New documents showing that former Special Counsel Jack Smith’s team accessed the contents of private text messages of more than 40 lawmakers are raising questions about whether he misled Congress when he testified last year. In December, Jack Smith appeared before Congress and testified that the “toll records,” or telephone records, his team requested for members of Congress did not include the content of those messages. 

“Did you request that the toll records from the members of Congress include the content of text messages,” a congressional investigator asked Smith. 

“No,” Smith answered definitively. 

However, the newly released records show that Smith’s team did in fact access the private text messages of 44 individual lawmakers and did so by apparently bypassing the established Filter Team, which is responsible for evaluating and segregating privileged information, the Senate Judiciary Committee said. 

Speech or Debate clause of Constitution

“Communications from Members of Congress pertaining to their official legislative duties are protected from criminal prosecution under the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause,” the committee said in a press release. “Bypassing a Filter Team evades consideration of additional privileges, such as attorney-client privilege.”

The Speech or Debate Clause of the U.S. Constitution (Article I, Section 6) serves as a check on executive power and is designed to prevent members of Congress from being “questioned in any other place,” ensuring they cannot be subjected to the scrutiny of the Justice Department or the judicial branch for their legislative acts.

Republican lawmakers say the new records indicate that the Justice Department should investigate whether Smith misled Congress in his testimony last year. “Under 18 USC § 1001, knowingly making false statements to Congress is a federal crime punishable by up to five years in prison,” said Missouri Senator Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., who sits on the Judiciary Committee. “It looks like that's exactly what Jack Smith did.”

Hawley: "Looks like perjury"

“Jack Smith should be subject to prosecution for lying to Congress,” Schmitt said on Wednesday.

“Looks like perjury,” Missouri’s other Senator Josh Hawley, R, wrote in a post to X. 

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, who testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday at a confirmation hearing, suggested that his agency could probe Jack Smith’s prior statements to Congress. “We take testimony in front of this body very seriously, yes,” Blanche answered when asked by Sen. Hawley whether Smith’s testimony should be investigated. 

The scope of Smith’s probe, which centered on Trump’s challenge to the 2020 election results and the events of January 6, 2021, was expansive. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, previously released records showing that Smith's office issued nearly 200 subpoenas in his sweeping Arctic Frost-linked case, secretly seeking records on more than 400 Republican personalities and groups. This included more than 160 Republicans—many closely connected to Trump.

Smith, who was appointed special counsel by then-Attorney General Merrick Garland, conducted a sweeping investigation into then-former President Trump over alleged mishandling of classified materials and efforts to overturn the 2020 election. Trump was later indicted in both cases, which were dropped after he won the 2024 presidential election and Smith resigned. 

"Arctic Frost" was one of four separate probes that targeted Trump and his allies stretching from summer 2016 to January 2025. The other probes were code-named Crossfire Hurricane, Round River, and Plasmic Echo, Just the News reported earlier this year. 

Grassley: "Worse than Watergate"

In 2025, the first FBI documents to be made public by Congress showed that records belonging to eight Republican senators and one GOP House member were swept up in Smith’s probe into the events surrounding the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol. 

Grassley, who released the documents, said that in 2023 the FBI “sought and obtained data about the senators’ phone use” surrounding Jan. 6 as part of its probe into President Trump’s conduct on that day. Lawyers for Smith have defended their client's decision to obtain the phone records.

“Based on the evidence to-date, Arctic Frost and related weaponization by federal law enforcement under Biden was arguably worse than Watergate,” Grassley said in a statement last October. “What I’ve uncovered today is disturbing and outrageous political conduct by the Biden FBI. The FBI’s actions were an unconstitutional breach, and [then-] Attorney General Bondi and Director Patel need to hold accountable those involved in this serious wrongdoing.”

Smith has also faced scrutiny over the apparent coordination between his team and the senior leadership of the Biden Justice Department. Last October, Grassley released evidence showing that then-Attorney General Merrick Garland, then-Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, and then-FBI Director Christopher Wray signed off on the launch of the inquiry into Trump related to the Capitol riot. That probe became known by the codename “Artic Frost.” 

Biden's weaponized FBI targets Trump and allies

Trump and other Republicans repeatedly alleged that Smith and the FBI were themselves engaging in election influence by trying to bring charges, hold trials, and obtain convictions against Trump ahead of the 2024 election. The FBI raided Trump’s Florida home in Mar-a-Lago in August 2022 with the authorization of Garland. Then, Biden's attorney general picked Smith in November 2022 to lead the twin criminal investigations into Trump. 

The FBI’s Arctic Frost investigation also targeted dozens of GOP officials and organizations, according to documents released by Grassley in September. 

An FBI document from the Arctic Frost inquiry dated January 2023 showed that the investigation’s “targets” included Donald J. Trump for President Inc., Turning Point USA, the Republican Attorneys General Association, the America First Policy Institute, the Save America PAC, the Conservative Partnership Institute, and many more, Just the News previously reported.