According to former acting Solicitor General Neal Katyal, Donald Trump will likely be indicted for a third time sooner rather than later, despite continuing developments in the investigation.
Special counsel Jack Smith last week sent the former president a letter informing him he was a target of the probe into 2020 election interference. Trump announced the news on Truth Social Sunday night.
Katyal said Smith would have expected Trump to post about it “within minutes.”
“So I do think his ducks are probably all in a row,” the former Justice Department official said of Smith and his team of prosecutors.
“There’s some new evidence about Bernie Kerik, and so on. But I think none of that’s probably going to slow this thing down,” Katyal added.
A lawyer for Kerik revealed Monday that that former New York police commissioner had handed over thousands of pages of material to Smith. Kerik, a Trump ally, helped Trump to gather supposed evidence of fraud to support his effort to overturn the 2020 election.
“For Jack Smith to send that letter, he had to be pretty sure he was going to indict, and indict soon,” Katyal said. “So I expect this week. But look, could it be next week or the week after? You know, absolutely.”
A target letter does not guarantee an indictment, but legal experts have indicated it’s very likely. It’s not clear what charges Trump would face.
If it happens, it will be Trump’s third indictment this year. He was charged with dozens of felonies in March in the Stormy Daniels hush money case, and also faces federal charges over his handling of classified documents in a separate case led by Smith.