Republicans want Jack Smith to testify about his investigations into Donald Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified documents and efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election. Now the former special counsel is calling their bluff: He says he wants to do it in front of the public.

In a letter to House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan and Senate Judiciary Chair Chuck Grassley on Thursday, Smith’s legal team requested that their client be given the opportunity to testify publicly to refute the “many mischaracterizations” of his investigations.

Smith’s lawyers also requested DOJ guidance on what exactly their client would be allowed to discuss, as well as access to the special counsel’s files.

“With the guidance and access described above, Mr. Smith is available to testify in an open hearing at your earliest convenience,” they wrote.

Last week, Jordan demanded that Smith appear in a closed-door session to discuss his investigations. Specifically, Jordan was incensed by a revelation that Smith had requested Senate Republicans’ phone records from the days before and after the deadly January 6 riot, in order to see who may have been involved in Trump’s alleged efforts to subvert the election. Trump earned himself four felony counts for those alleged efforts. Those charges were dismissed after he was elected to the White House in 2024.

“As the Committee continues its oversight, your testimony is necessary to understand the full extent to which the Biden-Harris Justice Department weaponized federal law enforcement,” Jordan wrote.

Speaking on CNN Thursday as a senior law enforcement analyst, former FBI Director Andrew McCabe said it was a great idea for Smith to go public. “I think it’s important that he’s speaking up in a way to kind of demystify what has been grossly misrepresented to the American people by the senators,” he said.

McCabe also explained that the kind of telephone records Smith had requested were run-of-the-mill investigative practice, and that it would have been conducted under the purview of a grand jury subpoena.

“This is not something that a prosecutor, an FBI agent, [would] just dream up off the top of their heads and, you know, call up the phone company and say, ‘Hey, send us everything you have.’ There is a process. These records are accessed lawfully under the purview of the grand jury,” he said, adding that the request had been “grossly misrepresented” by Republicans.

Senator Rand Paul is tired of being the only Republican senator willing to stand up to President Trump.

The libertarian spoke with Politico’s Dasha Burns just days after being deliberately left out of Trump’s gathering of GOP senators in the Rose Garden. “We have everybody but one person here,” Trump said Wednesday. “We’re just missing one person. You’ll never guess who that is. Let me give you—he automatically votes no on everything. He thinks it’s good politics. It’s really not good politics.”

Paul addressed the rift between himself and Trump in an interview with Burns, released on Friday.

“The president considers it to be bizarre and weird, but I believe that we should have less debt, and we should balance our budget.... I take it as a badge of courage, really,” Paul said. “There has to be someone left. What if there’s no one left who actually believes in balanced budgets? To me, I’m worried about the demise of a conservative voice within the Republican Party if we all become rubber stamps.”

While the Kentucky senator is certainly a supporter of the president, he has made a string of decisions that make his commitment to a more traditional brand of conservatism clear. He has come out against the extrajudicial Caribbean drug boat bombings, was “not a big fan” of Trump’s military parade, and most notably was one of only three Republican senators to vote against Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act on the grounds that it would increase the national debt by $3.3 trillion.

“If I’m given the choice of President Trump versus Harris or versus Biden, without question, I choose President Trump over and over again,” Paul told Burns. “But that doesn’t mean I’m going to sit back and just say, ‘Oh, I’m leaving all my beliefs on the doorstep. I’m no longer going to be for free trade. I’m no longer going to be for balanced budgets. I’m no longer going to be opposed to killing people without trials, without naming them, without evidence.’ No, I have to remain who I am.”

Paul also expressed discomfort with Trump’s willingness to attack any Republican who may disagree with him, like Representative Thomas Massie, who the president wants primaried, or even Paul himself.

“It’s a warning sign: ‘Oppose me or my policies and I’ll come after you.’ And I don’t think that’s good for the Republican Party, nor do I think it’s good for the country,” Paul continued. “I think what made America great is capitalism ... it’s a fallacy to say the nation’s being hollowed out by trade,” referring to Trump’s trade wars.

Paul also shed light on a deep fear of challenging the president on anything within the party.

“I hear a lot of flack from Republicans and they want me to do it. They say, ‘Oh, well, you’re not afraid of the president. You go tell him his nominee can’t make it,’” Paul said. “I’m just tired of always being the whipping boy.”

The full interview is available here.

Donald Trump is mad at Canada again, this time over a TV ad criticizing his tariffs.

In a Truth Social post late Thursday night, Trump declared that “ALL TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH CANADA ARE HEREBY TERMINATED” thanks to an ad, paid for by the government of Ontario, which used audio from a 1987 speech from President Ronald Reagan where he said, “Trade barriers hurt every American worker and consumer.”

In a statement, the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute—which thus far has not had much to say about Trump’s tariffs—said that the ad misrepresented Reagan’s remarks and that the Province of Ontario did not seek permission to use the audio, and that it “is reviewing its legal options in this matter.” Trump attached this statement to his post.

On Friday morning, Trump blasted Canada again, claiming the country “CHEATED AND GOT CAUGHT!!!”

“They........

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