By
Special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into Donald Trump’s classified documents scandal has already led to the former president’s criminal indictment. The question has long been whether Smith’s parallel probe, into the Republican efforts to overturn the 2020 election, would generate the same result.
The answer is coming into sharper focus. My MSNBC colleague Jordan Rubin explained this morning:
Donald Trump on Tuesday said he received a target letter in special counsel Jack Smith’s Jan. 6 probe, which, if true, would indicate charges against the former president are coming related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. In a rambling social media post styled as a Trump 2024 campaign statement, the leading GOP presidential candidate said he got the letter on Sunday, which he said gave him four days to appear before the grand jury on the matter.
To be sure, it’s impossible to know when to believe the former president’s claims. In fact, ahead of his first indictment in New York, the Republican made up a date when he expected to be charged, which turned out to be false.
That said, in this instance, Trump’s latest claim appears to be true: NBC News confirmed with two sources with direct knowledge of the matter that he really did receive a target letter from the special counsel’s office.
At first blush, this might not seem especially surprising. Smith and his office have been pursuing this case for months, and it’s been widely assumed that the former president was and is at the center of the investigation. By this reasoning, didn’t everyone already know that Trump was a target of the probe?
The angle to keep in mind, however, is that in the world of criminal prosecutions, “target” is a term of art. Revisiting our earlier coverage, a separate NBC News report recently explained, “There are three general categories in criminal investigations: a witness (someone with relevant information), a subject (someone whose conduct is within the realm of the grand jury’s work) and a target (someone prosecutors believe committed a crime).”
Justice Department guidelines encourage prosecutors to notify targets in advance of filing charges — and those who receive target letters are often indicted.
Or put another way, the fact that Trump and his lawyers received such a notification was not at all good news for the Republican.
According to his version of events, the former president has been offered an opportunity to appear before the grand jury considering evidence in this case — and it’s an invitation he will almost certainly decline.
Chuck Rosenberg, a former U.S. attorney, senior FBI official, and legal analyst for NBC News, explained on MSNBC today, “It’s an invitation from the Department of Justice for Trump to present his side of the story to the grand jury if he so chooses. But there’s nothing in it for him. There’s absolutely no way this man could tell the truth. Lying to a federal grand jury could bring additional charges, including possible perjury and obstruction of justice. He’s very, very unlikely to talk the grand jury out of indicting him. So, I expect he respectfully declines.”
Once that happens, the special counsel is likely to propose an indictment to the grand jury, which will decide whether to bring charges.
As for Trump, he conceded in his weird and meandering written statement that he’s facing a “probable fourth” indictment, which also happens to be true: As we discussed this morning, the former president’s lawyers asked the Georgia Supreme Court to prevent possible charges from the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office. The justices were unanimous in rejecting the case, making an indictment that much more likely.
Meanwhile, in the classified documents case, Judge Aileen Cannon, whom Trump appointed, is meeting today with prosecutors and the defendant’s attorneys to discuss the upcoming proceedings.