Special Counsel Jack Smith’s investigations into President-elect Donald Trump cost taxpayers more than $50 million.
According to financial disclosures from the Special Counsel’s Office, Smith used about $9.25 million from November 22 to March 2023. From April 2023 to September 2023, his office spent $14.66 million. A third disclosure reveals that from October 2023 to March 2024, Smith’s office used about $11.84 million taxpayer dollars.
Figures for April 2024 through September 2024 have yet to be released, although costs are estimated to be around $12 million, based on the average from the three previous disclosures, Fox News explained.
Adding the estimated figure with the three disclosures, the total expenditures by Smith’s office amount to nearly $47.5 million. Other reports believe the final number will be over $50 million.
Earlier this week, Judge Tanya Chutkan agreed to dismiss Smith’s January 6 case against Trump.
“As a result of the election held on November 5, 2024, the defendant, Donald J. Trump, will be inaugurated as President on January 20, 2025. It has long been the position of the Department of Justice that the United States Constitution forbids the federal indictment and subsequent criminal prosecution of a sitting President,” Smith’s court filing on the matter read.
“But the Department and the country have never faced the circumstance here, where a federal indictment against a private citizen has been returned by a grand jury and a criminal prosecution is already underway when the defendant is elected President,” it continues, adding, “After careful consideration, the Department has determined that [Office of Legal Counsel’s] prior opinions concerning the Constitution’s prohibition on federal indictment and prosecution of a sitting President apply to this situation and that as a result this prosecution must be dismissed before the defendant is inaugurated.”
In her decision to dismiss the case, Chutkan wrote, “The Government has moved to dismiss the Superseding Indictment without prejudice.” She added that “[w]hen a prosecutor moves to dismiss an indictment without prejudice, ‘there is a strong presumption in favor’ of that course. A court may override the presumption only when dismissal without prejudice ‘would result in harassment of the defendant or would otherwise be contrary to the manifest public interest.’ As already noted, there is no indication of prosecutorial harassment or other impropriety underlying the Motion, and therefore no basis for overriding the presumption—and Defendant does not ask the court to do so.”
Trump responded to Chutkan’s decision, writing on Truth Social that the cases against him were “empty and lawless, and should never have been brought.”
