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Texts cited by Eric Schmitt at Jack Smith hearing lacked team names: Report
Confirmed
In Short: During Tuesday's Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Missouri Senator Eric Schmitt accused former special counsel Jack Smith of perjury over a supposed Atlanta Hawks game attendance on February 3, 2024.
Schmitt claimed he had text messages showing Smith attended a Hawks game in Atlanta, suggesting a potential collusion with Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis.
However, Smith denied ever attending an Atlanta Hawks game, stating he was at a women's college basketball game featuring the University of Iowa Hawkeyes playing the University of Maryland in the Washington, DC, area.
Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, after clearing up the matter, said Schmitt should apologize.
Schmitt's allegation rested on an apparent mix-up between the Atlanta Hawks and the Iowa Hawkeyes.
Democrats got Schmitt to allow Smith to review the evidence, a poster featuring the texts in question.
Smith explained he was seeking additional proof that GOP lawmakers had talked with Trump and his team during the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol.
Schmitt's office told The Hill that the senator had never received a message naming the basketball teams involved.
Schmitt's staff had been warned by Republican staff on the Judiciary Committee that the texts were unvetted and it was their responsibility to verify the information.
Schmitt's attempt to trap Smith backfired, with Smith declaring he had never been to an Atlanta Hawks game and had never visited Atlanta on that date.
The mix-up became a viral gaffe, with Schmitt's aides holding up a poster board that appeared to show text messages indicating seats had been reserved for Smith.
Schmitt's office insisted Smith attended an Atlanta Hawks game, but the texts did not name the teams involved.
Schmitt's team seemingly found texts, crafted a theory, and never bothered to verify the information.
What this adds
The texts did not name the basketball teams involved.
Schmitt's team was warned the texts were unvetted.
Smith was actually at a women's college basketball game featuring the Iowa Hawkeyes.
What's confirmed
- To substantiate his theory, Schmitt cited text messages he suggested showed Smith had been at an Atlanta Hawks game on February 3, 2024 – the day after Fulton County prosecutor Fani Willis and special prosecutor Nathan Wade admitted to an affair.
- He later told the “Charlie Kirk Show” that he was just asking questions and seeing whether Smith would ensnare himself.
- He said he was not at a game featuring the Atlanta Hawks, but rather the University of Iowa Hawkeyes women’s basketball team – which then featured Caitlin Clark – at the University of Maryland in the Washington, DC, area.
- Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, after clearing up the matter, said Schmitt should apologize.
- WASHINGTON — Special counsel Jack Smith, who brought two indictments against now-President Donald Trump in 2023, testified in front of Congress again on Tuesday — this time, to the Senate Judiciary Committee.
- Smith’s testimony comes as Republicans continue to probe the investigations into Trump and as some in the party, including the president, have pushed for often-unspecified criminal charges to be brought against Smith.
- Eric Schmitt of Missouri crafted an apparent conspiracy theory about Smith being tied to the prosecution of Trump in Fulton County, Georgia.
- “What would you say if I had a series of text messages from your team that said you were in Atlanta at a Warriors-Hawks game on February 3, 2024 – the day after Willis and Wade announced their affair?” Schmitt said.
- Eventually, Democrats got Schmitt to allow Smith to actually review the evidence – a poster featuring the texts in question.
- Judiciary staff, however, explicitly warned Schmitt’s team that the texts were unvetted and that it was their responsibility to verify the information, the source said.
What's still developing
- In one of them, a fellow prosecutor asks about a seat being reserved for Smith.
- But by this point, Smith seemed to put it together.
- As they prepared for the testimony of former special counsel Jack Smith, Republican staff on the Senate Judiciary Committee gave Sen. Eric Schmitt a warning: The texts they had obtained from the Justice Department — which Schmitt suggested was proof Smith had colluded with a Georgia state prosecutor — were “unvetted,” according to a source with direct knowledge of the conversation.
- According to a source familiar with the committee process and two sources familiar with the matter, the Department of Justice shared materials with GOP staff on the Judiciary Committee ahead of Smith’s hearing.
- Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley’s team assembled a memo about key information for the hearing, according to one source.
- Grassley also did not share the texts with Democratic senators before the hearing, according to a Democratic staffer and another source briefed by committee staff.
- That omission deepened Democratic suspicion that congressional Republicans and the Trump administration were working together to undermine or trap Smith, one of the people said.
- Schmitt’s staff came to the Republican staff asking for material showing a connection between Smith’s investigation — which probed efforts by Trump and his allies to overturn the 2020 election through bogus claims of fraud — and Willis’ probe into whether Trump sought to manipulate the Georgia election results, according to a source with direct knowledge.
- The source said such back-and-forths over potential material is common practice ahead of congressional hearings.
- Instead, they showed Smith’s office taking the routine investigative step of gathering the time and date of phone calls, but not the content of those calls.
- Smith said he already had evidence that Trump and his team had called lawmakers “to exploit the violence” at the Capitol and block the certification of Joe Biden’s victory in the election.
- Schmitt made it clear he was trying to catch Smith in a lie, but he appeared to have another goal as well.