Former President Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of 2020 are unprecedented in U.S. history, special counsel Jack Smith says in a new court filing that opposes the ex-president’s attempt to dismiss the federal conspiracy case against him.
Mr. Smith made the claim in pushing back on Mr. Trump’s assertion that others who questioned, challenged or protested election results were never prosecuted.
“The defendant stands alone in American history for his alleged crimes,” Mr. Smith and his team wrote in a filing late Monday. “No other president has engaged in conspiracy and obstruction to overturn valid election results and illegitimately retain power.”
Mr. Trump has pleaded not guilty to a federal indictment that charges him with conspiring to defraud the U.S. and its citizens by organizing sham electors following his loss to President Biden and pushing then-Vice President Mike Pence to reject electoral votes.
Mr. Trump’s attorneys have moved to dismiss the indictment ahead of the trial, which is scheduled for March. They say the indictment violates Mr. Trump’s constitutional rights, including First Amendment protections, and amounts to selective and vindictive prosecution of a political opponent.
Mr. Smith, in his response, said even if Mr. Trump could offer evidence of his personal belief the election was rigged or stolen, “it would not license him to deploy fraud and deceit to remedy what he perceived to be a wrong, and it would not provide a defense to the charge.”
As a whole, Mr. Smith is trying to separate Mr. Trump from previous candidates who challenged election results or described Mr. Trump’s own presidency as illegitimate, alleging Mr. Trump took pernicious and illegal steps following his 2020 loss.
“The defendant attempts to rewrite the indictment, claiming that it charges him with wholly innocuous, perhaps even admirable conduct — sharing his opinions about election fraud and seeking election integrity — when in fact it clearly describes the defendant’s fraudulent use of knowingly false statements as weapons in furtherance of his criminal plans,” Mr. Smith wrote.
Mr. Smith also pushed back on defense claims that Mr. Trump cannot be prosecuted after his impeachment acquittal by the Senate, writing that “the defendant offers no plausible argument that he was acquitted in the Senate of the same offenses charged in the indictment.”
Attorneys are arguing back and forth in pre-trial motions while Mr. Trump is steeped in a civil trial in New York that accuses his namesake business of fraudulent practices. The ex-president testified he did nothing wrong, and that banks were happy to work with him based on his valuable properties and ability to pay back loans.
He says the lawsuit and criminal cases related to the 2020 election and classified documents found at his Mar-a-Lago estate are part of a coordinated effort by Democrats to thwart his 2024 presidential campaign. He is the front-runner in the GOP primary by a wide margin.
In a separate filing Monday, Mr. Smith opposed the Trump team’s effort to strike language in the indictment that refers to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.
“The defendant’s decision to repeatedly stand behind Jan. 6 rioters and their cause is relevant to the jury’s determination of whether he intended the actions at the Capitol that day,” Mr. Smith’s team wrote.
• Tom Howell Jr. can be reached at thowell@washingtontimes.com.
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