Loading summary
Transcript2 lines
- [00:00]
A
Foreign. 2026 yesterday, the Department of justice announced it is creating a 1.776 billion dollar anti weaponization fund to compensate what it calls victims of the Department of Justice under former President Joe Biden. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanch said the fund was a lawful process for victims of lawfare and weaponization to be heard and seek redress. First of all, the insistence of Trump cronies that the Department of Justice and federal judges weaponized the law against them under former President Joe Biden or under former President Barack Obama is another example of regime officials blaming others for what they themselves are doing as Trump's appointees try to manufacture criminal cases against those Trump considers his enemies. Trump's attacks on the justice system are designed to convince his followers that he hasn't really committed the crimes for which he has been indicted and sometimes convicted, and they help to undermine faith in the rule of law, weakening our democracy. Second of all, though, what this agreement is not is a settlement of Trump's case against the Internal Revenue Service, or irs, although that term is being widely used to describe it. Trump withdrew his $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS for damages after a contractor leaked his tax information along with that of more than 400,000 other taxpayers during his own first term after it became clear that the judge to whom the case was assigned seemed inclined to say that the case could not move forward because Trump could not be in charge of both sides of the suit. The recognition that this is not a legal settlement is important. The Trump administration maintains it is doing what the Obama administration did in establishing a compensation fund to settle the case of Keeps Eagle v. Vilsack when the Department of justice established a $760 million fund as a settlement of a long running class action suit charging that the Department of Agriculture had systematically discriminated against indigenous farmers and ranchers. Unlike the Keeps Eagle settlement, though, Trump's fund is not part of a legal settlement. In her order dismissing the suit, Judge Kathleen Williams noted that because Trump's dropping of the suit does not reference any settlement or include a stipulation of settlement, there is no settlement of record. Additionally, defendants federal agencies represented by the Department of Justice, which has an independent obligation to uphold the public's strong interest in knowing about the conduct of its government and expenditure of its resources, and the Fair Administration of Justice neither submitted any settlement documents nor filed any documents ensuring that settlement was appropriate where there was an outstanding question as to whether an actual case or controversy existed. Judge Williams was not alone in her skepticism about the deal. Andrew Duran of the New York Times reported today that career lawyers at the Internal Revenue Service thought the agency should fight Trump's suit, noting that the statute of limitations for such a suit had run out. The Justice Department has previously taken the position that people cannot sue the IRS for the actions of a contractor. And the Justice Department settled a similar case from hedge fund billionaire Ken Griffin with a public apology rather than a monetary payoff. The document that purports to be a settlement has the words settlement agreement written in capital letters across the top of it, but the important word is agreement. It is not the settlement of a legal case. Trump dropped the case when it looked like the judge would throw it out. It is simply an agreement between Trump and his own appointees at the Department of Justice. And what an agreement it is. It says that Trump and his older sons, who also brought and dropped the suit, will receive a formal apology from the United States, but will not receive any monetary payment or damages of any kind. The agreement sets up a fund made up of five people, four of whom Trump's hand picked attorney General, will choose. The fifth will be chosen in consultation with congressional leadership, but Trump can remove any one of them without cause. That group has complete say over how it decides to grant or deny claims, but what it does will be confidential, overseen only by the Department of Justice. The fund ends in December 2028, just after the 2028 presidential election. If all the money isn't spent by then, Trump gets to decide to which federal account it goes. In essence, then, the agreement gives Trump full control over almost $2 billion of taxpayer money to spend however he wants, without oversight. The Department of Justice document establishing the fund declares that once the funds are deposited into the designated account, the United States has no liability whatsoever for the protection or safeguarding of those funds, regardless of bank failure, fraudulent transfers or any other fraud or misuse of the funds. On the agreement, the signature of the lawyer representing the United States is not that of Acting Attorney General Todd Blanch, but rather that of Stanley E. Woodward Jr. Who has been a key defense attorney for people in Trump's orbit accused of committing crimes, including Cash Patel, now FBI director Trump trade Advisor Peter Navarro and Walt Nauta, the Trump aide indicted for his actions surrounding Trump's retention of classified documents. Woodward also has represented a number of those charged with crimes relating to the January 6, 2021 storming of the US Capitol. With the announcement of the agreement, the Treasury Department's top lawyer, Brian Morrissey, resigned. The agreement says the amount dedicated to the fund does not represent the value of any current claim by Trump, but rather is based on the projected valuation of future claimants claims and thus is not taxable income for the Trumps, who receive no economic benefit from the agreement. But the number the Justice Department released for the establishment of the fund puts the the lie to the idea the number was random. It is $1.776 billion, linking the fund directly to the attempt of Trump and his cronies to destroy American democracy and begin it again on their terms. Famously, on January 6, 2021, newly elected representative Lauren Boebert, a Republican of Colorado, Posted today is 1776 during the attack, the rioters shouted 1776. Representative Jamie Raskin, a Democrat of Maryland, told Greg Sargent of the New Republic that Trump and his loyalists are figuring out a way to refund the January 6th militia, presumably to get them ready for the next round of battle. As political scientist Jonathan Ladd noted, the 14th Amendment to the Constitution prohibits compensation for those who engaged in insurrection. It says that neither the United States nor any state shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void. In his comments to Sargent, Raskin noted that if the fund pays off the January 6 rioters, the government will be doing precisely using federal taxpayer dollars to compensate people who participated in insurrection. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanch testified before a subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee today. Facing senators for the first time since taking over for fired Attorney General Pam Bondi, he refused to rule out paying money to rioters who had attacked police officers. Senator Chris Van Hollen, a Democrat of Maryland, noted that an individual who, after being pardoned by the president, went on to molest two children and that person actually tried to buy the silence of these children by saying that he would pay them some of the funds that he was hoping to get from your slush fund. Can you commit to making the rules so that that person is not eligible for a payout under this fund? Blanche accused Van Hollen of obviously lying because no such fund existed until yesterday. But in fact, administration officials have talked about paying off the January 6 rioters since at least December 2024. And in June 2025, the Justice Department paid close to $5 million to the family of Ashley Babbitt, killed by police as she tried to break into the House of Representatives. Apparently based on those signals, Florida's Andrew Paul Johnson, a January 6 rioter pardoned by Trump, was convicted earlier this year of sexually abusing two 12 year olds and trying to buy their silence by saying he would share some of the millions of dollars in restitution money he expected the Trump administration would pay him for his January 6th case. Van Holland went on to read a series of news stories reporting that January 6th rioters expected payments since Trump's blanket pardon of nearly 1600 of those convicted of crimes relating to the January 6th attack on the US Capitol. Many of them have been re arrested for crimes. At the time of Johnson's sentencing, Representative Jamie Raskin, a Democrat of Maryland, noted that Trump's support has made the January 6 rioters think they're untouchable. Then today, the plot got even thicker. A document, this time signed by Blanche himself, amended the previous agreement to add the United States releases, waves, acquits and forever discharges Trump, his sons and the Trump Organization and is hereby forever barred and precluded from prosecuting or pursuing any and all claims that as of yesterday have been or could have been asserted by the IRS against them or related or affiliated individuals or companies. In other words, Blanche is asserting a blanket promise to stop all IRS audits of Trump's taxes and not to prosecute any crimes Trump, his family, his businesses or his associates might have committed that crossed the IRS in 2024. Russ Bouttner and Paul Keel reported in the New York Times that Trump had been double dipping his tax breaks for years. In her civil discourse, legal analyst Joyce White Vance called the document from the Department of Justice a pardon on steroids. Vance commented that the optics of this are so bad that it's hard to believe Trump would expose himself to their consequences unless he really needed this deal. It's probably worth remembering that after years of pursuing the gangster Al Capone, the government finally managed to convict him of tax evasion. It appears Blanche and Trump's loyalists are trying to make sure that can't happen again, declaring any such investigations the weaponization of the Justice Department. Holly Baxter of the Independent reported today that in the midst of all the chaos, including his war on Iran and rising fuel and food prices, Trump called a sudden, urgent press conference today as Blanche was testifying. But what was on his mind was not Iran or prices or his corrupt agreement with the Department of Justice. He wanted to talk about his ballroom. Trump's comments in that press conference have invited commentary suggesting he is turning the White House into a fortress. Describing the ballroom, he said, between the drone proofing, the missile proofing we have and the drone capacity upstairs, we can have all sorts of military I hate to use the word snipers, but we have great sniper capacity. It's built for our snipers. Not enemy snipers, our snipers. And because of the height, we get a very clear view of everything all over Washington.
- [15:12]
B
Letters From An American was written and read by Heather Cox Richardson. It was produced at Soundscape Productions, Dedham, Massachusetts, recorded with music composed by Michael Moss.