The real reason Jack Smith just added a war crimes prosecutor to his case against Donald Trump

| 3:50 pm EDT September 23, 2023
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If you’re trying to predict what kinds of charges (and targets) might be involved in a prosecutor’s case, it’s often helpful to look at who’s being added to the team. If a prosecutor hires an expert in financial fraud, for instance, it’s a good sign that someone is getting charged and tried for financial fraud.

So it raised a lot of eyebrows yesterday when the news surfaced that DOJ Special Counsel Jack Smith was adding war crimes prosecutor Alex Whiting to his team. Donald Trump has seemingly committed every crime under the sun, but war crimes? What’s going on here?

As so often ends up being the case, the answer is in the details. Yes, Whiting is a war crimes prosecutor. But so was Jack Smith prior to taking over the Trump probe. In fact Whiting is Smith’s longtime right hand man.

So what we’re seeing here is probably not a matter of Jack Smith looking to bring war crimes charges against Trump or anyone else, but rather a matter of Smith wanting his longtime deputy at his side as he prepares to put Trump on trial. Prosecutors can excel in more than one area. Just ask longtime war crimes prosecutor Jack Smith.