Grassley Says Jack Smith's Team Read Text Messages of 44 Members of Congress, Skipped Required Filter Review

Grassley and Sen. Ron Johnson released Justice Department records this week showing Special Counsel Jack Smith's investigative team obtained and reviewed text messages sent by 44 members of Congress, Republicans and Democrats alike, as part of the Biden DOJ's investigation into Donald Trump's actions around January 6, 2021, and the classified documents case.

The records came out of the two senators' ongoing Arctic Frost oversight probe, named after the DOJ's internal codename for the investigation. Grassley chairs the Judiciary Committee; Johnson chairs the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. Both say the disclosures came after they received whistleblower complaints and requested records directly from DOJ.

The core allegation: Smith's team bypassed a filter team review. Filter teams exist specifically to screen seized communications for privileged material, attorney-client privilege, executive privilege, and in this case, material protected by the Constitution's Speech or Debate Clause, before investigators ever see the content. According to the DOJ's own cover letter to Grassley and Johnson, that step didn't happen here. Investigators went straight to the content of texts sent to White House officials during Trump's first term.

Both Grassley and Johnson say their own texts were among those obtained. So were Rand Paul's. Paul posted on X, in a message viewed more than a million times, calling it "a blatant abuse of power, and exactly what our Founders warned about." Josh Hawley's reaction was shorter: "Looks like perjury." Cindy Hyde-Smith called it "a stunning abuse of power that should alarm every American, regardless of party."

That last line matters. Democrats had texts swept up too, according to Grassley. He's explicitly calling on Democratic colleagues to treat this as a separation-of-powers problem, not a partisan one. Democrats and Smith's defenders are holding a different line, arguing the investigations were built on evidence from the 2020 election aftermath and the Capitol riot, and were run through normal DOJ procedures independent of the White House.

The Constitutional Question

The Speech or Debate Clause is about as close to an absolute protection as the Constitution contains. It says members of Congress "shall not be questioned in any other place" for speech or debate performed in their legislative role. The Supreme Court's reasoning in Doe v. McMillan ties that immunity to keeping the legislative branch free from executive interference while doing its job.

Whether reading a lawmaker's texts to White House aides counts as touching "legislative" activity, or whether it's just ordinary staff coordination outside that protection, is a real legal question that hasn't been resolved by a court. Internal DOJ records obtained by Grassley reportedly show attorneys inside the department raised the Speech or Debate issue themselves before the surveillance happened, and the concern was set aside rather than resolved.

The Federalist's reporting goes further than the other outlets, alleging Smith "lied to" Congress by testifying he'd only received toll records, timestamps and metadata, not message content. That's a serious claim: if Smith told Congress under oath that he only had metadata when his team had actually read the text content, that's a potential perjury exposure, which is exactly what Hawley was gesturing at on X. The records show the content was accessed. Whether Smith's earlier testimony was knowingly false, or whether he was describing a different, narrower request, hasn't been established by any independent finding, court ruling, or admission. Smith told Congress in a December deposition, according to the Post, that he takes Speech or Debate protections "seriously," without directly addressing the discrepancy Grassley now says the records reveal.

No court has ruled that Smith's team violated the Constitution. No charges have been filed against Smith or his former investigators. This is Grassley and Johnson's characterization of DOJ's own records, not a judicial finding. The distinction matters: what's documented is that a filter team was bypassed and message content from 44 lawmakers was reviewed. What's alleged, by Grassley and conservative outlets, is that this was both unconstitutional and that Smith misled Congress about the scope of what his team obtained.

Grassley says he intends to bring Smith before the Senate Judiciary Committee "in the coming months" to answer for it directly. That hearing hasn't been scheduled yet. Until it happens, or until a court weighs in on whether the Speech or Debate Clause was actually breached, this remains a documented process failure with contested legal consequences, not a settled case of prosecutorial misconduct.