Amna Nawaz
Amna Nawaz
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WATCH: Rep. Jordan questions Jack Smith about paying confidential sources in Trump investigations

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January 22, 2026

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Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, chair of the House Judiciary Committee, asked former special counsel Jack Smith on Thursday how much money he and his team spent in investigating President Donald Trump.

Smith, who told the chair he couldn’t recall the specific amount, spearheaded two cases into Trump that probed his mishandling of classified documents and role in the Jan. 6 attack.

Jordan said the total estimate was around $35 million from taxpayers. The chair then asked how much of that money was given to confidential human sources, citing a $20,000 payment to a particular source.

Smith said that wasn’t a payment from his office, but a payment from the FBI approved by him for a source who assisted in reviewing video and photographic evidence related to the Jan. 6 Capitol attack. Smith said he didn’t know the identity of this source.

The hearing is an opportunity for the career prosecutor to publicly offer his inside perspective on the investigations, which both led to unprecedented indictments. Both were scuttled once it was clear that Trump would return to the Oval Office; Department of Justice policy prevents prosecution of a sitting president.

Republicans and the president have accused Smith of pursuing a politically motivated case against the president. Trump has denied wrongdoing while attacking Smith, calling him a "criminal" who ought to be investigated and "put in prison."

Smith defended his investigations in an hourslong closed-door meeting with lawmakers in December, saying he said he had "proof beyond a reasonable doubt" of what his investigations laid out. He’s denied accusations of bias.

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WATCHRep Jim Jordan R-OhioHouse Judiciary CommitteeJack SmithPresident Donald Trump SmithOval Office DepartmentWatch PBS NewsPBS News Hour

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WATCH: Rep. Jordan questions Jack Smith about paying confidential sources in Trump investigations · Amna Nawaz · Sentinel