Washington DC - Former federal prosecutor Jack Smith has shared his thoughts about the state of the Department of Justice today under President Donald Trump's leadership.

In videos recently obtained by The New York Times, Smith delivers a speech at an event at the Cosmos Club in Washington on April 20, where he lamented that the DOJ of today "targets people for criminal prosecution simply because the president doesn't like them."

Smith – who is typically tight-lipped on his personal views – argued that the DOJ has been "corrupted over the last year" by Trump appointees who are more eager to impress their boss than follow laws, rules, and norms.

The prosecutor also criticized the Trump administration for apparently firing federal employees for not doing his bidding and portraying them as Democratic partisans in an effort to undermine the criminal justice system.

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"To erode the rule of law in our country, you need to attack these people, and that is what we have seen since January of 2025," Smith said, adding, "This attack on public servants – it's not a byproduct of the attack on the rule of law. It is a central component of it."

In a statement, a spokesperson for the DOJ responded simply, "I would expect nothing less from Jack Smith."

In 2023, Smith was appointed special counsel to oversee cases involving Trump's alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 election and the mishandling of classified documents the president took after leaving the White House after his first term.

After the documents case was dismissed by a judge, and the election case was dropped after Trump won re-election, Smith ultimately resigned from his role.

Last August, Trump launched a probe into Smith and has called on the former special counsel to be arrested and charged for supposedly weaponizing the justice system against him.

In January, Smith testified before the House Judiciary Committee, during which he defended his work and doubled down that he had gathered more than enough evidence to prove the president's guilt.