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{"id":27446,"date":"2026-10-08T08:49:46","date_gmt":"2026-10-08T08:49:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/democrats-call-on-chuck-grassley-to-apologize-to-jack-smith-for-basketball-gaffe\/"},"modified":"2026-10-08T08:49:46","modified_gmt":"2026-10-08T08:49:46","slug":"democrats-call-on-chuck-grassley-to-apologize-to-jack-smith-for-basketball-gaffe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/democrats-call-on-chuck-grassley-to-apologize-to-jack-smith-for-basketball-gaffe\/","title":{"rendered":"Democrats call on Chuck Grassley to apologize to Jack Smith for basketball gaffe"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>Senate Judiciary Democrats are asking chair Chuck Grassley to apologize to Jack Smith on the behalf of his GOP committee members \u2014 especially for Sen. Eric Schmitt, the Missouri Republican who falsely accused Smith of secretly attending an NBA game in Atlanta to conspire with local prosecutors about bringing charges against President Donald Trump.<\/p>\n<p>The letter, spearheaded by ranking member Dick Durbin of Illinois and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/f\/?id=000001a1-1801-d058-adf3-3a695a000000\" target=\"_blank\">obtained exclusively<\/a> by Blue Light News, also demands Grassley turn over the underlying records Schmitt used during a hearing last month to levy the false allegations against Smith, the Biden-era special counsel investigating whether Trump sought to overturn the results of the 2020 election and mishandled classified documents. <\/p>\n<p>The episode, Democrats wrote, \u201ccaused needless confusion, slowed down the business of the Committee, introduced the possibility that false information would be entered uncontested into the record, and created an embarrassing stain on one of the most important committees in Congress.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Democratic letter to Republicans marks an escalation of the typical bickering between the two parties. It\u2019s also reopening a not-yet-closed wound for Republicans, whose efforts to damage Smith\u2019s reputation during their high-profile hearing <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2026\/09\/29\/jack-smith-hearing-senate-judiciary-01098107\" target=\"_blank\">were blunted by Schmitt\u2019s error<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Congressional Republicans have for years been working to undermine Smith\u2019s investigations as politically motivated, and many GOP senators on the Judiciary Committee hoped to use their hearing with Smith to catch him in either a lie or an admission he weaponized the judicial system against Trump.<\/p>\n<p>To that end, Schmitt used a giant poster to display images of text messages from Smith\u2019s team in an attempt to prove the special counsel was in Atlanta on Feb. 3, 2024, for an NBA basketball game between the Atlanta Hawks and the Golden State Warriors \u2014 scheduled around the same time local prosecutor Fani Willis, who was working to convict Trump over his 2020 election subversion scheme, was facing damaging questions about her conduct.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/gettyimages-2297722017.jpg\" alt=\"Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.) and Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) display a sign accusing Jack Smith of meeting with Fani Willis during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 29, 2026.\" data-portal-copyright=\"Chip Somodevilla\/Getty Images\" data-has-syndication-rights=\"0\" data-license-id=\"2297722017\" data-licensor-name=\"Getty Images\" data-title=\"Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.) and Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) display a sign accusing Jack Smith of meeting with Fani Willis during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 29, 2026.\"><\/p>\n<p>Smith ultimately clarified he did not attend the NBA game on that date but was instead at a women\u2019s basketball game at the University of Maryland between the Terrapins and the University of Iowa Hawkeyes, then led by star player Caitlin Clark. The exchange went viral and Schmitt continues <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/live-updates\/2026\/09\/30\/congress\/schmitt-regrets-nothing-01100053\" target=\"_blank\">to show no regret<\/a> for his apparent misunderstanding.<\/p>\n<p>The text messages \u201cestablished only that Senator Schmitt had not done the basic due diligence of verifying a document before relying on it,\u201d the Democrats wrote in their letter to Grassley, adding that, \u201cnonetheless, Senator Schmitt incorrectly asserted to Mr. Smith, \u2018I think you\u2019ve already perjured yourself,\u2019 and inexcusably branded him \u2018a dirtbag,\u2019 language which is beneath the dignity of this Committee and the Senate.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>And because Democrats didn\u2019t have advance access to the materials Schmitt referenced in his presentation during the hearing, they said they were \u201cwere forced to synthesize these baseless accusations and respond in real time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Democrats also took aim at another record they say was not shared with them ahead of time: a readout of an Aug. 17, 2024, phone call between Smith and the Public Integrity Section of the Justice Department, which Schmitt and fellow Missouri GOP Sen. Josh Hawley both referred to during the Senate Judiciary hearing. <\/p>\n<p>The notes from that phone call, which Hawley mentioned during his questioning of Smith, indicated the Public Integrity Section advised Smith to wait to file an updated indictment against Trump until after the 2024 presidential election. Smith had originally sought to file an amended indictment in the 2020 election subversion case following the Supreme Court&#8217;s ruling that Trump had broad immunity for official actions undertaken as president.<\/p>\n<p>Smith testified during the hearing that several drafts of a superseding indictment were passed back and forth before one was ultimately approved and filed in August 2024.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe ask that you immediately provide all committee records that you have withheld, commit to fully complying with Senate Rules \u2026 going forward, and apologize to Mr. Smith on behalf of the Committee,\u201d the Senate Judiciary Democrats wrote.<\/p>\n<p>Clare Slattery, a spokesperson for Grassley, said in a statement, &#8220;it&#8217;s Jack Smith who owes an apology to the thousands of Americans he and his staff ran roughshod over.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>Spokespeople for Smith, Schmitt and Hawley did not immediately respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Senate Judiciary Democrats are asking chair Chuck Grassley to apologize to Jack Smith on the behalf of his GOP committee members \u2014 especially for Sen. Eric Schmitt, the Missouri Republican who falsely accused Smith of secretly attending an NBA game in Atlanta to conspire with local prosecutors about bringing charges against President Donald Trump. The [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27447,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27446","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-congress"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27446","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27446"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27446\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27447"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27446"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27446"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27446"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}