President-elect Donald Trump would have been convicted of illegally trying to overturn the result of the 2020 presidential election – which he lost – if he had not successfully been re-elected in 2024, according to the man who led US government investigations into him.
The evidence against Trump was “sufficient to obtain and sustain a conviction at trial,” Special Counsel Jack Smith wrote in a partially released report.
Trump hit back, saying Smith was “deranged” and his findings were “fake”.
Trump was accused of pressurising officials to reverse the 2020 result, knowingly spreading lies about election fraud and seeking to exploit the riot at the US Capitol on 6 January 2021. He denied any wrongdoing.
Trump, who was president at the time of the alleged crimes, subsequently spent four years out of office – but was successfully re-elected to the White House in November. He will return to the presidency next week.
After his success in the 2024 vote, the various legal issues that he had been battling have largely evaporated. The interference case has now been dismissed.
Smith says in the report he “stands fully behind” the merits of bringing the prosecution and the strength of the case.
He went on to say it was only the fact the US Constitution forbids the prosecution of a sitting president that ended it.
“But for Mr Trump’s election [in 2024] and imminent return to the presidency, the office assessed that the admissible evidence was sufficient to obtain and sustain a conviction at trial.”
Some of the material in Smith’s report was already known thanks to a public filing in October, which gave details of Trump’s alleged efforts to overturn his defeat.
But the report, which was released by the Department of Justice (DoJ) to Congress, gives further detail on why Smith pursued the case, and ultimately closed it.
Source: BBC
