Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., told Fox News Digital his Republican colleagues are right to be troubled that the Justice Department spied on lawmakers to aid former special counsel Jack Smith’s investigations.
“I think we need to have more facts. Look into it. Republicans are rightly concerned about the possible breach of norms and improper access to email,” Blumenthal told Fox News Digital Wednesday.
The GOP-led Senate Judiciary Committee released a trove of documents Tuesday showing that Smith’s investigation into President Donald Trump included the Department of Justice collecting text messages between 44 members of Congress, among them Republicans and Democrats, and White House staff.
The messages were purportedly related to Smith’s probe of the Jan. 6 breach of the Capitol and Trump’s storage of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.
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Other Democrats were less willing than Blumenthal to lend credence to Republican concerns regarding how Smith carried out his investigation.
“I’ve got no comment on that. If you want to talk about the news of the day, I will,” Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., told Fox News Digital, referencing acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s confirmation hearing. Booker was among the lawmakers who had their text messages seized by the Justice Department.
Sens. Adam Schiff, D-Calif.; Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii; Alex Padilla, D-Calif.; and Patty Murray, D-Wash., all declined to comment on the issue when approached by Fox News Digital.
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Blumenthal’s remarks mark a rare note of bipartisan concern over Smith’s handling of politically sensitive communications, even as other Democrats avoided weighing in on the GOP-led probe. The new documents have intensified Republican scrutiny of whether Justice Department safeguards failed during highly consequential investigations into Trump, while raising fresh questions about how far prosecutors went in accessing lawmakers’ private communications.
“I think Jack Smith is a political hack. I think that’s why the Justice Department, under President Biden, picked him,” Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., told Fox News Digital.
“Everybody knows he’s a political hack. He never should have been near power. He shouldn’t be near power now because he can’t exercise it objectively or non-emotionally.”
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The Judiciary Committee claims the lawmakers’ messages were reviewed in a way that runs afoul of DOJ protocol.
A “filter team” was supposed to review the communications before Smith’s investigative team could look at them, according to the documents. Contractors managing document review software for the filter team, however, failed to properly set up permission guardrails, allowing the investigative team to examine documents that had not been screened, according to a letter sent to Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, by the DOJ.
“He honestly believes he’s smarter and more virtuous than the American people. He’s not, and that’s what got him in trouble,” Kennedy told Fox News Digital in reference to Smith.
After the Senate Judiciary Committee released the documents on Tuesday, multiple Republican lawmakers alleged that Smith perjured himself by answering “no” to a question from a congressional lawyer about whether he requested text messages from lawmakers as part of his investigation.
“I don’t know whether it was misleading. I just, I really haven’t followed it,” Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., told reporters regarding the allegations against Smith.