Jack Smith has spent $35.7 million on the two cases against Donald Trump.
$19 million has gone to primarily the salaries of staff members and $16 million has gone to unreimbursed component costs.
Special counsel Jack Smith’s office has spent $35.7 million on two federal prosecutions of former President Donald Trump since 2022.
A federal judge in Florida dismissed one of those cases. The other case, in Washington D.C., remains pending after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling found presidents have broad immunity for official acts taken while in office.
Smith’s office has directly spent $19,437,874, primarily on salaries for staff members. The office reported another $16,306,612 in unreimbursed component costs, which includes non-reimbursed expenditures attributable to the investigation, such as hours worked by agents and investigative support analysts, according to public reports filed by Smith’s office.
The prosecutions are funded by “the permanent, indefinite appropriation for independent counsels.”
Jack Smith’s classified documents case was thrown out. He is appealing this ruling.
U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon on Monday dismissed the classified documents case against former President Donald Trump over the manner in which special counsel Jack Smith was appointed.
“The Superseding Indictment is DISMISSED because Special Counsel Smith’s appointment violates the Appointments Clause of the United States Constitution,” wrote Cannon, who was appointed to the bench by the former president. She said the Constitution gives only Congress or the president the authority to appoint a special counsel — not the U.S. Attorney General.
Smith had contested this argument, and other federal courts had upheld the constitutionality of special counsels. But Cannon’s ruling, even in the likely event of an appeal, adds months to the case.
“None of the statutes cited as legal authority for the appointment…gives the Attorney General broad inferior-officer appointing power or bestows upon him the right to appoint a federal officer with the kind of prosecutorial power wielded by Special Counsel Smith,” Cannon wrote. “Nor do the Special Counsel’s strained statutory arguments, appeals to inconsistent history, or reliance on out-of-circuit authority persuade otherwise.”
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