Trump Shows 'Sign of Desperation' as Special Counsel Appointed: Kirschner

Former federal prosecutor Glenn Kirschner said Saturday that Donald Trump showed a "sign of desperation" by criticizing the wife of Jack Smith, the special counsel appointed to oversee two criminal investigations related to the former president.

"So facing multiple criminal investigations, Donald Trump decides that a good strategy would be to attack the prosecutor's spouse," Kirschner said during a video he posted to Twitter.

Last Tuesday, Trump said that prosecutors would be biased in their investigations against him because of Smith's wife's political views, which lean towards Democratic.

The former president shared a few screenshots on Truth Social showing that Smith's wife, Katy Chevigny, worked as a producer on former first lady Michelle Obama's documentary Becoming. He also shared a tweet by Chevigny in which she said "thank goodness" that Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election.

"This is just a small amount of information from the wife of the hard-line Radical Left Special Counsel (prosecutor), an acolyte of Eric Holder and Barack Hussein Obama," Trump wrote in his Truth Social post.

Another screenshot that the former president shared in his post showed Chevigny describing how Wisconsin Democrats "picked themselves off the floor" after Trump's "shock" win in the state in the 2016 presidential election.

Kirschner on Saturday also referenced a recent article by Salon that reported on Trump's criticism of Smith's wife, who donated $2,000 to Biden's campaign, according to Federal Election Commission (FEC) records.

"So Trump alleges that if the prosecutor's spouse is a Democrat, well then the prosecutor cannot go after, cannot investigate, cannot indict corrupt or criminal Republican politicians because of the prosecutor's spouse's politics. That's absurd," the former federal prosecutor said.

"None of this is gonna work and all of it is a sign of desperation because I think Trump finally knows that accountability is coming for him," Kirschner said, adding that Trump's "latest attack" on Chevigny will not slow Smith down from doing his job nor will it present any conflict.

The legal analyst for MSNBC and NBC went on to say that Trump's criticism of Smith's wife is an indication of him knowing that the evidence against him is "compelling" and "strong."

"He feels the hot breath of justice on the back of his neck so what does he do? Well, if you can't defeat the message, you gotta go after the messenger. Maybe the messenger's spouse," Kirschner said.

Earlier this month, Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed Smith, a veteran prosecutor, as the special counsel who will oversee the Department of Justice's (DOJ) probe looking into Trump keeping highly classified documents, which were seized by the FBI in August, at his Mar-a-Lago home. The former president has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing in regard to the documents and said that any classified documents he took had already been declassified.

Smith will also oversee some parts of a separate investigation related to last year's Capitol riot and Trump's possible role in trying to overturn the 2020 presidential election results.

In a recent statement, Smith said he will "independently" judge the investigations and move the cases "forward expeditiously and thoroughly to whatever outcome the facts and the law dictate." He will still have to report to Garland, who will ultimately decide whether or not to bring charges against Trump in either investigation.

Newsweek reached out to Trump's media office for comment.