Former federal prosecutor, now CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig tore into both special counsel Jack Smith and federal Judge Tanya Chutkan for breaking all norms to unseal a court filing in the 2020 election interference cast against Donald Trump just as voters are going to the polls.
The 165-page brief contains “evidence” Smith plans to present, if the case ever goes to trial. So that’s a headline Smith clearly wanted to get to the media.
“The larger, if less obvious, headline is that Smith has essentially abandoned any pretense; he’ll bend any rule, switch up on any practice — so long as he gets to chip away at Trump’s electoral prospects. At this point, there’s simply no defending Smith’s conduct on any sort of principled or institutional basis,” Honig wrote in article for New York Magazine’s Intelligencer, titled “Jack Smith’s October Cheap Shot,” published Thursday.
He explained prosecutors do not make their evidence public before the trial begins, because our legal system is structured to protect the defendant, including the presumption of innocence. Making prosecutor’s evidence public before trial can taint the jury pool.
There are pre-trial hearings and motions to determine exactly what evidence will be permitted to