Legal/Law/Criminal Justice and Reform

Unearthed Records Reveal Scale Of Jack Smith’s Arctic Frost Text Message Spying Spree

former Special Counsel Jack Smith (Screen Capture/CSPAN)

Documents released Tuesday reveal in new detail the scope and intrusiveness of the Biden Department of Justice and FBI’s criminal investigations into President Donald Trump and hundreds of individuals and organizations in his orbit after the 2020 election.

Special Prosecutor Jack Smith and his team peered into the text messages of 44 members of Congress, according to the new tranche of documents.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley of Iowa said in a statement that Smith “ran roughshod over the Constitution.” Smith has denied that his office spied on lawmakers.

Smith made repeated intrusions into the communications of member of Congress, the same branch of government tasked with providing oversight of the FBI’s secret work and reining in its excesses. Members of Congress swept up in the probe include the leaders of the committees that oversee the Department of Justice: Grassley and House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan, as well as other critics of FBI’s abuses like former House Intelligence Committee Chair Devin Nunes.

Grassley said he intends for Smith to appear before his Senate Judiciary Committee for an interrogation.

Smith didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Grassley and Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations Chairman Ron Johnson released the documents as part of an ongoing probe into the investigation the FBI codenamed “Arctic Frost” that began in April 2022. The sprawling investigation into a 2020 fake elector scheme that mired Trump’s campaign to return to the White House ensnared hundreds of conservative individuals and entities.

The new release also involves two other investigations: One relating to January 6 codenamed “Project Coconut” and one related to Mar-a-Lago documents codenamed “Project Cranberry.”

The documents and a detailed explanatory memo reveal that DOJ protocol mandates the use of “filter teams” to protect the constitutional rights of the individuals involved in an investigation, but that Smith bypassed these legal protections.

In June 2023, Smith’s office received a massive trove from the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA): 54 spreadsheets of text messages from inside Trump’s orbit, obtained from the White House custodian.

Within an hour senior attorney Thomas Windom was eavesdropping on the conversations of Trump and his top advisors in his first administration: former Chief of Staff Mark Meadows; former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe; former Deputy Chief of Staff Dan Scavino; daughter Ivanka Trump; Vice President Mike Pence; and many others. It appears the review was done without waiting for the review of privileged information.

The new release precedes a primetime presidential address that Trump will give on Thursday. The address will be about election integrity issues, according to multiple reports.

“Jack Smith’s criminal investigation of President Trump was a runaway train that had no brakes. Based on the information that’s been produced to me and Senator Johnson, Biden DOJ and FBI investigators apparently ignored their own routine investigative protocols to obtain and review work-related messages from me and dozens of my Republican and Democrat colleagues who were outside the scope of the government’s investigation,” Grassley said.

“Jack Smith’s team acted with impunity as they disregarded their own protocols to obtain and access White House text messages, including messages to and from 44 Members of Congress,” Johnson said. “At this point, no one should be shocked by Jack Smith’s recklessness and blatant abuse of power, but they should be outraged.”

Smith’s team hoovered up texts from October 2020 through Jan. 20, 2021, the day former President Joe Biden was inaugurated.

The team obtained the congressional texts despite receiving a warning from an attorney in the DOJ’s Public Integrity Section that it may violate the Speech or Debate Clause, according to the memo.

The FBI deems investigations of public officials — as well as religious organizations, members of the press, and political candidates — “sensitive investigative matters.”

A January 2026 government watchdog report first revealed in January that the FBI has conducted more than 1,000 sensitive investigative matters in so-called “assessments” that require no evidence of a crime.

FBI codename “Arctic Frost” also refers to a species of orange.

Here are the members of Congress swept up in Smith’s probe, per the Senate investigation:

1. Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa)
2. Senator Ron Johnson (R-Wis.)
3. Senator John Cornyn (R-Texas)
4. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.)
5. Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.)
6. Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah)
7. Senator Cory Booker (D-N.J.)
8. Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Miss.)
9. Senator Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska)
10. Senator David Perdue (R-Ga.)
11. Senator Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.)
12. Senator Martha McSally (R-Ariz.)
13. Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.)
14. Senator Rick Scott (R-Fla.)
15. Senator Rob Portman (R-Ohio)
16. Senator Roy Blunt (R-Mo.)
17. Senator Susan Collins (R-Maine)
18. Senator Tim Scott (R-S.C.)
19. Senator Tom Cotton (R-Ark.)
20. Senator Cory Gardner (R-Colo.)
21. Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.)
22. Rep. Steve Scalise (R-La.)
23. Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio)
24. Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.)
25. Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.)
26. Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.)
27. Rep. Mark Walker (R-N.C.)
28. Rep. Bryan Steil (R-Wis.)
29. Rep. Dan Newhouse (R-Wash.)
30. Rep. Doug Collins (R-Ga.)
31. Rep. Dusty Johnson (R-S.D.)
32. Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.)
33. Rep. John Katko (R-N.Y.)
34. Rep. Joshua Gottheimer (D-N.J.)
35. Rep. Karen Bass (D-Calif.)
36. Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.)
37. Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-N.Y.)
38. Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (R-Fla.)
39. Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.)
40. Rep. Morgan Griffith (R-Va.)
41. Rep. Rodney Davis (R-Ill.)
42. Rep. Russ Fulcher (R-Idaho)
43. Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.)
44. Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.)