Donald Trump target in Jan. 6 investigation, predicts arrest and indictment in Jack Smith probe

WASHINGTON – Donald Trump confirmed Tuesday he is a target of a federal investigation into the insurrection of Jan. 6, 2021, and could be indicted soon on charges related to efforts to overturn his loss of the 2020 election.

In a written statement, Trump said special counsel Jack Smith sent a letter "giving me a very short 4 days to report to the Grand Jury, which almost always means an Arrest and Indictment."

The former president, a 2024 presidential candidate who has already been indicted twice this year, did not say whether he would appear before this grand jury. Trump did not detail what specific charges may be pending and said his attorneys spoke to him Sunday night about Smith's letter.

Indictment this week or next?

Attorneys familiar with these kinds of investigations said a target letter means that charges are imminent.

"Using the Mar-a-Lago case as a guide, an indictment could come next week,” said Brandon Van Grack, a former senior Justice Department lawyer and prosecutor who served as a lead prosecutor for special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Trump and the Russian government’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election.

Grack said an indictment could even come this week. "It's totally possible," he said, depending on when the grand jury in the case meets to hear evidence and hand up charges to the judge in the case. But given all of the moving parts, he said it's "more likely it would be next week."

Why is Trump being investigated?

It is not known precisely what Trump could be charged with in a sprawling and complex investigation.

The special counsel probe centers, in part, on whether Trump incited supporters to storm the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, seeking to stop the Electoral College vote that made Joe Biden president.

It also includes Trump's efforts to overturn Biden's wins in several states, and whether the then-president conspired with others to block certification of Biden's victory. Those states include Georgia, where Trump is the subject of a separate state investigation being conducted by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis.

What is a target letter?

A target letter is a document that prosecutors send to people under investigation, inviting them to testify about their actions and warning them that they could be subject to arrest and indictment.

Trump received a similar notice before his June 8 indictment in Florida on charges of obstruction of justice and mishandling classified documents. Smith also heads up that investigation.

Trump has denounced all the investigations as politically motivated attempts to derail his 2024 campaign, and attacked prosecutor Smith in personal terms. In his Tuesday statement, he called it "a very sad and dark period for our Nation!"

Trump's town hall in Iowa; DeSantis reaction

Trump is expected to provide more reaction in a Tuesday night town hall hosted by Fox News host Sean Hannity.

The event is being held in Iowa, which begins the Republican nominating process with caucuses on Jan. 15.

Trump's opponents had little initial reaction to his latest target letter. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, his closest challenger in the polls, questioned why Trump was slow to react to the Jan. 6 riot, but also criticized what he called the "weaponization" of law enforcement.

“I think it was shown how he was in the White House and didn’t do anything while things were going on" during the Jan. 6 event, DeSantis told reporters during a campaign stop in South Carolina.

He added, however, that "to try to criminalize that – that’s a different issue entirely.”

After his first two indictments, Trump actually rose in the polls among Republican voters, though independents are more critical of him.

Republicans rally around Trump; Democratic reaction

As they have with Trump’s past legal troubles, Republican lawmakers quickly flocked to the former president’s defense, accusing the Department of Justice of having a double standard when it comes to treating Trump and Biden.

“We have yet again another example of Joe Biden’s weaponized Department of Justice targeting his top political opponent, Donald Trump,” Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., and chair of the House GOP conference said at a news conference Tuesday. “This is a two-tiered system of justice that is fundamentally un-American.”

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise questioned the timing of the latest target letter.

“Isn’t it interesting (this happens) the same week we see President Biden’s poll numbers continue to fall, the same week that President Trump’s poll numbers continue to rise?” Scalise said at a news conference.

In addition to the federal classified documents case in Florida, Trump has been indicted by a New York state grand jury for hush money payments.

Democrats, meanwhile, sat back and enjoyed it all. Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., chair of the House Democratic Caucus, said the target letter was not "surprising."

The now-disbanded House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack "laid out the truth," Aguilar said at a news conference Tuesday. "We're appreciative of the work of the Department of Justice and their focus on staying true to finding the facts and holding people accountable."

Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., who prosecuted the second House impeachment against Trump on charges he incited the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021, told reporters the target letter signaled there will be criminal accountability for everybody who committed crimes related to the attack.

“We’re talking about a violent insurrection surrounding an inside attempted political coup,” Raskin said. “This is a matter of the utmost pressing urgency to the American people.”

'Firmly in DOJ's sights'

Former federal prosecutors familiar with these investigations said the target letter effectively serves as notification that Trump will be charged by the Department of Justice with criminal felonies.

“In a normal case, sending a target letter signifies someone is firmly in DOJ's sights. Sending a target letter to the former president is virtual confirmation Jack Smith intends to charge him,” said Joyce White Vance, the former U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Alabama.

Glenn Kirschner, a former senior federal prosecutor, told USA TODAY that this letter should be viewed "through the lens of the DOJ definition of a 'target' as found in the US Attorney's manual, the federal prosecutors' procedural bible."

“A target is a person, one, for whom prosecutors have substantial evidence linking them to the commission of a crime and two, a person that the prosecutors view as a putative defendant," he said. "Translation:  A person the prosecutors intend to indict.”

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Trump target letter: Why he predicts another arrest, indictment