Special Counsel Jack Smith formally resigned from the Department of Justice (DOJ) on Friday, according to a court document.
“The Special Counsel completed his work and submitted his final confidential report on January 7, 2025, and separated from the Department on January 10,” DOJ officials wrote in a footnote on the 10th page of the Saturday court filing.
Smith was appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland in 2022. Since then, President-elect Trump has been hit with criminal charges in two cases, one surrounding his alleged mishandling of classified documents and the other of his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election. He has pleaded not guilty and has denied any wrongdoing.
His departure from the department comes during an ongoing battle between defense lawyers aligned with Trump and the department’s officials related to the releasing of one of Smith’s reports.
Lawyers for the president-elect’s ex-codefendants Walt Nauta and Carlos de Oliveira tried to keep Judge Aileen Cannon’s order in place that would bar the DOJ from publicly revealing a part of Smith’s report. Cannon has dismissed Trump’s classified documents case in July last year.
— Developing
