This article was originally published on Conservative Underground - Politics. You can read the original article HERE
Jack Smith is chomping at the bit to get his witch hunts against Donald Trump moving.
But he’s facing one hearing that could change everything.
And Democrats are crawling up the walls over the terrible bit of news Jack Smith just received.
Is this the end for this Jack Smith-led witch hunt?
Special Counsel Jack Smith’s witch hunt against former President Donald Trump for allegedly mishandling classified documents has been filled with setbacks for him.
Now, another such setback could be game over for his witch hunt.
U.S. District Court Judge Aileen Cannon indefinitely postponed the trial as both parties continue to work through pretrial motions.
The federal judge surprised many legal observers when she agreed to hold a hearing on the constitutionality of Smith’s appointment as Special Counsel.
Trump’s legal team argues that the entire case should be dismissed because Smith’s appointment as Special Counsel violated the Constitution.
Smith was a private citizen when Biden Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed him in 2022.
The vast power wielded by a Special Counsel requires that he be confirmed by the Senate under the Constitution’s Appointment Clause.
“The Appointments Clause does not permit the Attorney General to appoint, without Senate confirmation, a private citizen and like-minded political ally to wield the prosecutorial power of the United States,” Trump’s legal team stated in a February motion. “As such, Jack Smith lacks the authority to prosecute this action.”
Florida judge set to hear arguments about Smith’s appointment
Cannon agreed to have three outside attorneys argue for and against the constitutionality of Smith’s appointment in the hearing.
Attorney Gene Shaerr is arguing a position in the hearing from former Attorneys General Edwin Meese and Michael Mukasey, as well as law professors Steven Calabresi and Gary Lawson.
Smith argues that Attorneys General have appointed special prosecutors for decades.
But Messe and his allies point out that “nearly all the special prosecutors appointed during the past 40 years — aside from Smith and Robert Mueller — have been lawfully appointed pursuant to that Clause because they were already serving as Senate-confirmed U.S. Attorneys.”
Calabresi noted the vast power that Smith has in his role as Special Counsel.
He argued in an opinion piece for Reason that Smith had more power than the 93 U.S. Attorneys confirmed by the Senate because he has nationwide jurisdiction.
This opens the door for major abuses of power by a future Attorney General.
“We do not want future U.S. Attorney Generals, such as the ones Donald Trump might appoint, if he is re-elected in 2024, to be able to pick any tough thug lawyer off the street and empower him in the way Attorney General Merrick Garland has empowered private citizen Jack Smith,” Calabresi wrote. “Think of what that would have led to during the McCarthy era or in the Grant, Harding, Truman, or Nixon Administrations in all of which an Attorney General was corrupt.”
South Texas College of Law Houston Professor Josh Blackman will argue that Smith should be considered a government employee and not an “Officer of the United States.”
As such, if he remains Special Counsel, he can only do it “under the normal supervision of the politically accountable United States attorney for the Southern District of Florida.”
The fate of Jack Smith’s witch hunt in Florida is in the hands of Judge Cannon.
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