Smith was the staff director of the Rhode Island office of United States Senator Lincoln Chafee from 2000 until 2001.

[3][4][2] Smith was nominated on December 6, 2007, by President George W. Bush to a seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit vacated by Judge Bruce M. Selya, who assumed senior status on December 31, 2006.

Rhode Island's two Democratic senators, Jack Reed and Sheldon Whitehouse, both of whom had been cut out of Smith's selection by the White House,[5] issued a lukewarm joint response to the nomination: "Before giving someone a lifetime appointment to the federal bench we need to carefully review their record.

Previously, Whitehouse had suggested in September 2007 that the Senate should not consider any Bush appointment for the First Circuit that late in the president’s term.

[6] On January 2, 2009, his nomination was returned to the president under Rule XXXI, Paragraph 6 of the United States Senate.