Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., told Newsmax on Thursday he has no objection to former special counsel Jack Smith's team reviewing his private text messages if they were obtained as part of a legitimate investigation.

His comments came as Senate Republicans released records showing the special counsel's office reviewed communications involving 44 current and former members of Congress.

On "The Record With Greta Van Susteren," the ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee said he did not know why his 2019 and 2020 texts with White House officials under President Donald Trump, including former chief of staff Mark Meadows, were included, adding that the messages concerned negotiations over the National Defense Authorization Act.

Rep. Smith drew a line between what he called a legitimate election-interference inquiry and retaliatory targeting.

"If the Justice Department is pursuing a legitimate investigation and look, this is the great flaw in where Trump is coming from on all of this, is the notion that this wasn't a legitimate investigation," he said, pointing to the Jan. 6, 2021, protest at the U.S. Capitol and Trump's post-election calls to state officials.

He added that limits still apply: "They shouldn't make it public. They shouldn't use it as part of a personal vendetta."

Newly disclosed Department of Justice records show Jack Smith's investigative team accessed the contents of text messages tied to 44 lawmakers of both parties after apparently bypassing a filter team designed to screen for privileged material.

The messages, obtained through a June 2023 subpoena to the National Archives, spanned October 2020 through January 2021 and involved Trump officials including Meadows, Dan Scavino, and Stephen Miller.

Pressed by Van Susteren, a former defense attorney who said judges routinely rubber-stamp warrants, the lawmaker pushed back by citing his own background.

"I'm a former prosecutor. So I was on the other side. I always thought the judges were too deferential to the defense and blocking evidence," he said.

He argued that the former special counsel did not go looking for a target.

"Jack Smith didn't wake up and say, 'Hey, I want to try to find something on Donald Trump.' He had a set of facts in front of him about Trump's efforts to overturn the election, and he investigated it," the congressman said.

Rep. Smith conceded a legitimate oversight question remains, saying of the former special counsel's methods: "Did Jack Smith go outside the bounds of what the court said allowed him to do? Yeah, I think yeah, we should find that out."

His larger worry, he said, is the reverse pattern under the current administration: "What's most concerning about what Trump's Justice Department is doing is they're deciding, I don't like this person. Go find something on them."

Asked whether the same standard would apply if the current DOJ pulled records from 44 lawmakers, the congressman cited the prosecution of former Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., as a case in which surrounding records were properly swept in.

"It is legitimate to investigate people who, you know, are not guilty," he said. "There could be information contained in their records that produce evidence on somebody who did. I think you're allowed to look at stuff from innocent people."

Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, who announced the release with Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations Chair Ron Johnson, R-Wis., has said he intends to bring Jack Smith before the committee.

Rep. Smith previously told the House Judiciary Committee under oath that his office had not reviewed the contents of lawmakers' text messages, a statement Republicans argue is contradicted by the newly released documents.

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