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Jack Smith to Detail Trump’s Criminal Misconduct Before Congress and the Public
Today, former special counsel Jack Smith will testify before the House Judiciary Committee in a public hearing to explain why he indicted President Trump, countering the president’s baseless assertion that the indictments were politically motivated. In response, Lisa Gilbert, co-president of Public Citizen, issued the following statement:
“Today, Jack Smith will have a chance to tell the public what he has told lawmakers in private— namely how a jury would have found Trump guilty of a criminal scheme to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, if the evidence from his time as special counsel was utilized. Republicans are only now allowing this hearing simply because Judge Cannon’s injunction keeping the second volume of Jack Smith’s report private is about to expire. Keeping the truth locked away is an assault on the rule of law and on the transparency owed to the American people.
“Today will give the American people an opportunity to hear the facts that were collected against the authoritarian President Donald Trump, and why he was lawfully indicted due to violations of federal law; ones that did incredible damage to our democracy.”
Public Citizen is a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization that champions the public interest in the halls of power. We defend democracy, resist corporate power and work to ensure that government works for the people - not for big corporations. Founded in 1971, we now have 500,000 members and supporters throughout the country.
(202) 588-1000LATEST NEWS
'What Are They Hiding?' Trump's Secret Contract for White House Ballroom Revealed
"At every turn, President Trump has sought to conceal the facts about his monstrous multimillion-dollar ballroom,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal.
Apr 22, 2026
While the financing of President Donald Trump's planned $400 million White House ballroom has been shrouded in mystery for months, government watchdog Public Citizen has obtained important new information about the project's funding.
Public Citizen on Tuesday unveiled a copy of the funding agreement the Trump administration has used for the ballroom project after months of legal wrangling that forced the group to file a lawsuit to compel enforcement of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request it made last year.
As summarized by The Washington Post, the ballroom contract's provisions "allow wealthy donors with business before the federal government to contribute anonymously to a sitting president’s pet project, while exempting the White House from key conflict of interest safeguards and limiting scrutiny by Congress and the public."
While dozens of big-name corporate donors—including Amazon, Apple, Lockheed Martin, Google, Altria, and Union Pacific Railroad—have been public about their donations to the project, the fact that some donors can choose to remain anonymous is raising serious concerns among ethics experts.
Charles Tiefer, a retired law professor at the University of Baltimore with a long history of scrutinizing government contracts, told the Post that the contract's anonymity provisions could give the Trump administration an escape hatch from future congressional scrutiny.
"If Congress knocks on the door," Tiefer said, "the White House is going to slam it shut and say, ‘You’re not allowed to know these donors.'"
This means that there is no way to know whether these donors have business before the government, and no way to know if they expect to get something in return for their donations.
Kathleen Clark, a government ethics lawyer and law professor at Washington University in St. Louis, told the Post that the contract's very narrow scope of reviewing for conflicts of interest among donors renders it "nothing more than a sham."
Jon Golinger, democracy advocate for Public Citizen, said the key takeaway from the newly unearthed documents is that "anonymous donations are the heart of this agreement."
"The questions this raises are, of the hundreds of millions being funneled in secret, who are these anonymous donors, and what are they hiding?" Golinger added. "The American people deserve answers, and we’ll keep fighting until they get them."
Wendy Liu, Public Citizen attorney and lead counsel on the lawsuit to obtain the contract, said the administration's initial refusal to comply with a FOIA request was "flatly unlawful," and "the American people are entitled to transparency over this multimillion-dollar project, and this win gets us a bit closer to knowing the truth."
Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) blasted the Trump administration's efforts to hide the contract in a statement given to the Post.
“At every turn, President Trump has sought to conceal the facts about his monstrous multimillion-dollar ballroom,” Blumenthal said. “His administration has kept the contract under wraps, the identities of big dollar donors secret, and the American people in the dark about what big corporations have to gain by funding this boondoggle.”
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'Call Your Senator': New Iran War Powers Resolution Set for US Senate Vote
“This war has simply been a disaster, and there is absolutely no reason we should go full steam ahead back into it," says Sen. Tammy Baldwin.
Apr 22, 2026
Opponents of the US-Israeli assault on Iran are urging like-minded Americans to call their senators ahead of Wednesday afternoon's expected vote on yet another bid to curb President Donald Trump's power to continue waging his war.
Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) said she will force a vote Wednesday on a war powers resolution "to end Trump’s illegal war of choice in Iran."
“The ceasefire, which is being broken left and right, expires in less than two days, and Congress now must do its job," Baldwin said in a Monday statement referring to Trump's extended truce. "This war has simply been a disaster, and there is absolutely no reason we should go full steam ahead back into it."
TODAY Senate Democrats will force a vote on a War Powers Resolution to assert Congressional authority over Donald Trump’s reckless war in Iran for the FIFTH timeWill Senate Republicans finally step and exercise their constitutional responsibility?Via @warren.senate.gov
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— Senate Democrats (@democrats.senate.gov) April 22, 2026 at 10:16 AM
Baldwin noted Tuesday that 13 US service members "are dead and hundreds more are injured, gas and fertilizer prices are tthrough the roof, and we have already spent an untold amount of taxpayer money—but it certainly is in the tens of billions of dollars."
US-Israeli bombing has also killed or wounded more than 30,000 Iranians, many of them civilians, including hundreds of children, according to officials in Tehran and international organizations.
The National Iranian American Council (NIAC) urged Americans to "call your senator" ahead of Wednesday's vote.
NIAC said that "lawmakers who have defended Trump’s decision to go to war with Iran without congressional approval argue the president can legally wage the conflict for 60 days before needing authorization" under the War Powers Act of 1973, which was enacted during the Nixon administration toward the end of the US war on Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos.
"That 60-day clock is now almost up, just one week remains," the group added. "As that clock winds down, last week’s House and Senate votes make one thing clear: Support for reining in the war is growing, but not yet enough to force action. That leaves members, especially Republicans who have largely resisted these efforts, facing increasing pressure as the legal deadline comes into view."
Baldwin argued Monday that "diplomacy is the only way out of this mess—and that is where every ounce of attention of this administration should be, not threatening to commit war crimes."
Trump's threats have ranged from destroying Iranian power plants and bridges to genocidal destruction of Iran's entire civilization. Threatening to commit genocide and war crimes is a crime.
Baldwin said Monday that "the only question will be whether my Republican colleagues want to own the consequences" of Trump's war "raging on, or they will step up for the American people and put an end to this life-taking, cost-raising chaos.”
Every Republican senator with the exception of libertarian Rand Paul of Kentucky has voted against previous Iran war powers resolutions, the last of which was defeated in a 47-52 vote on April 15, with right-wing Pennsylvania Democrat John Fetterman the only Democrat to vote against the measure.
There have been four failed attempts in the House and Senate to pass Iran war powers resolutions. On Tuesday, Reps. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) and Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) said they will try to force a vote next week on yet another such measure.
In addition to Iran, members of Congress have tried—and failed—to pass multiple war powers resolutions limiting Trump’s attacks on Venezuela, whose president was kidnapped during a brief US invasion in January.
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Israel Condemned for Bombing Rescue Workers Trying to Reach Journalist Buried Under Rubble
"Israel treats journalism as a crime," said one Beirut-based editor.
Apr 22, 2026
The Israel Defense Forces were condemned on Wednesday following reports that the IDF dropped a grenade on Red Cross workers as they attempted to rescue a Lebanese journalist believed trapped beneath rubble in southern Lebanon.
Two journalists from the local media outlet al-Akhbar, Amal Khalil and Zeinab Faraj, were attacked by the IDF after arriving to report at the scene of a previous strike that had killed two civilians in a car in the village of Al-Tiri, according to Al Jazeera correspondent Heidi Pett.
The journalists, who were wounded, found that their own car was stuck under rubble from the second strike and that they were unable to leave.
Red Cross workers then spent hours attempting to reach the reporters. But according to the National News Agency (NNA), other Israeli attacks targeted a major road leading to the village "to prevent ambulance teams from reaching the two journalists.”
Faraj was rescued and brought to the hospital, where she is being treated for severe injuries that require surgery. The NNA and other Lebanese outlets reported that as she was transported to the hospital, the Red Cross vehicle came under Israeli fire, leaving visible bullet holes.
While Faraj was evacuated, however, Khalil remained trapped. According to Reuters, the Lebanese army asked the Israeli military to allow rescuers to retrieve her.
Lebanon's president, Joseph Aoun, also urged the Lebanese Red Cross to cooperate with the Lebanese army and United Nations peacekeepers to "carry out the rescue operation in the shortest possible time.”
But as the rescue workers lifted Khalil from the rubble, an Israeli drone dropped a stun grenade on them, believed to be a warning, which forced the workers to withdraw from the town, according to the Lebanese outlet LBCI. The Red Cross is expected to return later to continue the search for Khalil.
A recent profile of Khalil in the Beirut-based Public Source magazine celebrated her more than two-decade career, which began shortly before Israel invaded Lebanon in 2006. Though she resisted the label of "war correspondent," much of her work since 2023 has again focused on covering what she's described as "resistance" to Israeli aggression.
"I always highlight the steadfastness of ordinary people in their border villages, like the farmers who continued tending their land while the Israeli settlements across from them in northern Palestine were empty," Khalil said. "I debunk the enemy’s narrative of targeting only military sites by showing evidence of them bombing homes, farms, and killing children. After the [2024] ceasefire, I also started documenting how the destruction that followed was many times greater than what had occurred during the war itself."
According to Reporters Without Borders, Khalil previously received death threats from an Israeli phone number in September 2024, while she was reporting on the war that broke out between Israel and Lebanon earlier that year.
She received a message reading, "We know where you are, and we will reach you when the time comes." The message concluded, "I suggest you flee to Qatar or somewhere else if you want to keep your head connected to your shoulders."
The deliberate killing of journalists who are civilians constitutes a war crime under international humanitarian law.
The IDF said it was aware of reports that journalists were injured in Wednesday's attacks, but did not confirm them to The Associated Press. The IDF denied that it was preventing rescue teams from reaching the area. The military also said it “does not target journalists and acts to mitigate harm to them.”
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) found that last year was the deadliest year for journalists in the more than three decades since they began collecting data. An unprecedented 129 journalists and media workers were killed on duty last year. Israel was responsible for two-thirds of the press killings in 2024 and 2025, most of whom were Palestinians in Gaza.
Lara Bitar, editor of Public Source magazine, wrote on social media Wednesday that Khalil and her rescuers had come under attack “because Israel treats journalism as a crime.”
Bitar said, "Amal has been tirelessly and lovingly covering communities impacted by war, occupation, and displacement for decades."
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