Justice Department Says It Is Scrapping Trump’s $1.8 Billion Fund

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche told a House subcommittee Tuesday that the Justice Department has abandoned the $1.776 billion “anti-weaponization” fund created under President Trump’s settlement with the Internal Revenue Service. “We are not moving forward with the fund, period,” he told the House Appropriations subcommittee that handles Justice Department spending, NPR reported.

Pressed by Rep. Grace Meng, a New York Democrat, on whether that meant it would never move forward, Blanche answered, “Correct,” according to PBS NewsHour. PBS noted that he was not under oath, though lying to Congress is still a crime, and that he declined to put the decision in writing, saying his word was enough.

The reversal followed a run of setbacks. NPR reported that days earlier a federal judge in Virginia had temporarily blocked creation of the fund, and that a judge in Florida who oversaw Trump’s original lawsuit was weighing whether to reopen the matter after asking whether the case was a genuine dispute when the president was on both sides of it. Judge Kathleen Williams gave Trump’s lawyers until June 12 to respond, NPR said.

The political pressure came from inside the president’s party as well. NPR reported that some Republican lawmakers were reluctant to support the fund and that it had derailed Republicans’ plan to push a party-line bill funding immigration enforcement. PBS reported that Senate Republicans said they lacked the votes to advance a Homeland Security funding bill unless the fund was scaled back or eliminated, and that Senate Majority Leader John Thune and the House speaker were saying this week that their members were not on board with the fund. Sen. John Kennedy described the stalled ICE funding to PBS’s reporter as a “broken arm with a bone sticking out of it,” and PBS’s reporter said it now looked like the arm was “in a sling.”

Democratic lawmakers had called the fund a “slush fund” for Trump supporters. The administration said it was meant for people who say the government was weaponized against them, a complaint popular among some of Trump’s supporters during the Biden administration, NPR noted.

Blanche said the rest of the settlement stands. NPR reported that it includes provisions shielding Trump, his family and his companies from tax audits or enforcement over prior returns. PBS described it as retroactive immunity from the IRS for Trump, his sons and his businesses, plus a formal apology Trump expects from the government. Democrats raised concerns about that part of the deal. PBS said it remains unclear whether any money has changed hands under the settlement.

Skeptics doubt the matter is closed. Enrique Tarrio, whom PBS described as a January 6 figure convicted for helping plan the attack, told PBS he expects the administration to find other ways to pay people like him. For now, the practical effect is on the Senate calendar: PBS’s reporter said the funding bill might get back on track, with other legislation, including an intelligence bill, due in the Senate within about a week.