Special Counsel Jack Smith resigned from his position at the Justice Department on Friday, Fox News has learned.
The resignations, which have been expected since President-elect Trump was elected in November, were quietly announced Saturday in the footnote of a lawsuit.
“The Special Counsel completed his work and filed his final confidential report on January 7, 2025, and separated from the department on January 10,” the note said.
Smith was appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland in November 2022 to investigate the 2020 election interference case against Trump regarding January 6, as well as the Mar-a-Lago secret documents case. In 2017, Smith served as acting U.S. attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee during the first Trump administration.
In November, special counsel Jack Smith requested that charges he filed against Trump be dismissed in a case alleging he interfered in the certification of the 2020 election. (Bill O’Leary/The Washington Post via Getty Images)
The news came as the country awaited the release of Smith’s report into the election interference case. A recent court filing revealed that Garland plans to release the investigative report soon, possibly before Trump takes office on January 20.
On Friday, a federal appeals court judge ruled that this was not the case block the release of Smith’s report.
“As I have made clear with respect to every Special Counsel who has served since I took office, I am committed to making public as much of the Special Counsel’s report as possible, consistent with legal requirements and Department policy,” Garland wrote in a recent letter to House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, and Ranking Member Jamie Raskin, D-Md.
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Jack Smith speaks during a press conference in Washington, DC, in 2023. (Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
When Trump won the 2024 presidential election, Smith signaled that he would wind down his case against the newly elected president. In late November, Smith asked a judge to drop the charges against him President-elect Donald Trump in the DC case against him.
Before asking for the case to be dropped, Smith filed a motion scrap all deadlines in the 2020 election interference case against Trump in Washington, DC – a decision that was widely expected after Trump’s victory. After the cases were dismissed, Trump responded to the move by saying the investigations “should never have been initiated.”
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The special counsel’s resignation comes as his report is expected to be released before President-elect Trump takes office on January 20. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
“These cases, like all the others I have had to deal with, are empty and lawless and should never have been brought,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post. “It was a political hijacking and a low point in our country’s history that something like this could have happened, and yet I persevered, against all odds, and WON. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
Brooke Singman and Chris Pandolfo of Fox News Digital contributed to this report.
