Special Counsel Jack Smith, who indicted United States President-elect Donald Trump in two counts of improperly withholding classified documents and election interference, has resigned.
Reuters reports this.
The NYT previously wrote that he would resign before Donald Trumpʼs inauguration because he wants to get ahead of the US president-electʼs promise to fire him within "two seconds" of the inauguration.
Smith filed his resignation on January 10. Before that, he filed a final confidential report. It concerns Trumpʼs cases, explaining why certain charges were brought and why those that were considered were not brought.
The NYT noted that the report is unlikely to contain many new or revealing facts. At the time, the publication noted that one potential problem could be the review of it by US intelligence agencies for any classified information. This could take weeks for the intelligence agencies to do so.
Smithʼs report is set to be released, but Trump went to court, and a judge temporarily blocked the report from being released.
Trumpʼs lawyers argue that Smith had no legal authority to file the report because he was unconstitutionally elected to the job and was politically motivated.
In the classified documents case, the US District Judge Eileen Cannon dismissed all charges last July, also after ruling that Smith was improperly appointed as special counsel.
Smithʼs office appealed the decision. Prosecutors dropped their appeal against Trump after his election victory on November 5, but said they would continue to seek to renew charges against two Trump associates who were accused of obstructing the investigation.
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