DOJ Creates $1.7B "Anti-Weaponization Fund"; Trump Drops IRS Lawsuit

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I am helping others, who were so badly abused by an evil, corrupt, and weaponized Biden Administration, receive, at long last, JUSTICE!

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It became more complicated and a bumpy path than we hoped. The White House should have consulted Congress before it announced the settlement — it made everything way harder than it should be.

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We'll probably come up with some kind of guardrails.

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The notion of the federal government doling out compensation to rioters who sought to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power and violently assaulted members of the United States Capitol Police and Metropolitan Police Department on January 6, 2021 is absurd and offensive. Is it possible, on May 21, 2026, the Republicans finally found an ethical bridge too far? To prioritize rewarding these insurrectionists as if they have been victimized while hard-working, honest Americans struggle to make ends meet is indefensible.

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There's going to be some change to this judgment fund. I don't know what it's going to be, but it will be something that the White House and the Department of Justice agree on.

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There were fireworks at an epic level, and I got to say it's one of the roughest meetings I've seen in my entire time in the Senate. At least half of them were blasting the attorney general. They were pissed.

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This is one of the roughest meetings I've seen in my entire time in the Senate. Fiery does not begin to cut it. They were screaming at the acting attorney general. If the administration does not modify the anti-weaponization fund by the time Congress comes back into session, they've got a full-on revolt in the Senate.

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Trump has been one of the biggest victims of weaponization. I consider this an appropriate approach and use of tax dollars, as long as the guardrails exist. We have to have the accountability measures and the safeguards, so that it is not a quote, slush fund, where you're doling out monies to political allies that don't have legitimate claims. It needs to be fair and objective — that's why I think the Senate's going to find a path forward.

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We're not going to reward people that attack policemen and people of authority.

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It's horrible politics. It's horrible timing. I call it a payout pot for punks. There's no way you're going to make it better in its current form.

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Stupid on stilts. When you take money from me to give to a purpose that I vehemently disagree with, that's tyranny, and that's what that account is.

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I think there's reasonable limitations that can be put on it.

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I would have a real problem with compensating people who were convicted of attacking Capitol Police officers.

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So, the nation's top law enforcement official is asking for a slush fund to pay people who assault cops? Utterly stupid, morally wrong – Take your pick.

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This is a bipartisan bill to block the President's $1.7 billion slush fund to pay off January 6th criminals and other maladjusted minions! To allow it to continue would set a dangerous precedent.

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I think that there are — and will be, continue to be — a lot of questions around that that the administration is going to have to answer.

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I've never heard of someone negotiating with themselves and making a plea bargain with themselves.

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I think we need to make sure that no monies are going to pay out to people convicted of violent offenses, including people who beat up and assaulted Capitol police officers. I think we should attack it from every angle because it's an obscene use of taxpayer funds.

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There is nothing good about this. If Donald Trump wants to reward his political friends or the people who attacked the Capitol on January 6th, let him do it with his own money — he's got plenty of it. And he should not be using the taxpayers' money. This is corruption, pure and simple.

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I do think the oversight's important. Of course, you want to track how every taxpayer dollar is spent. This ought to be for working people whose constitutional rights were violated in their ordinary course of living — pro-life activists and others who might have a claim. The Justice Department should lean into its experience managing other compensation funds, like the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, which has a rigorous claims process.

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I'll be pushing to get this done as the Senate drafts funding bills this summer.

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I did raise that issue [about people who assaulted law enforcement potentially receiving payments], and that seemed to be what he was saying, but we haven't seen language.

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A massive discretionary fund, with no oversight or approval from Congress, represents a dangerous backsliding in the transparency of our institutions and our commitment to the American taxpayer.

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Trump is trying to commandeer nearly $1.8 billion in taxpayer funds to bankroll a slush fund for January 6 cop-beaters and aggrieved MAGA foot soldiers.

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It's very strange, very unprecedented. It's very concerning. I don't know why anyone is receiving money from this fund and I think there should be congressional oversight into how the fund came to be and the criteria for any distributions.

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I sense broad, bipartisan feelings on Capitol Hill that this is an outrageous slush fund for the president — almost $2 billion being spent in a completely secret manner with decisions made outside of Congress.

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It's our job in the Congress, in the Senate and the House to hold the executive branch accountable. We'll see how many actually join us in the effort by putting pen to paper. We have such a gap right now in trust with the public and the institutions.

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Not a big fan. I'm not exactly sure how they would use it, but my understanding is that was just announced. But yeah, I don't see a purpose for that.

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On first blush, it doesn't pass the smell test.

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The president has set up a slush fund, however you want to say that it got set up. And he literally will get to choose through his hand-picked appointees who gets paid that fund. That is absurd.

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Conceptually, I understand what he's trying to do, but I don't know. I think we need to ask more questions.

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I offer this amendment for one simple reason: taxpayer dollars should never be used to enrich a sitting president, his family or his political allies. Right now, Americans are struggling with high prices and economic uncertainty. Federal dollars should be used to lower costs and serve the American people and not create a slush fund for the president's political allies or to reward those who assaulted law enforcement.

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This has happened before in a Democrat administration, so I'm not sure you should be surprised that there's justice for people that have had the government weaponized against them.

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Rewarding individuals who committed crimes is obscene. Every American can see through this illegal, corrupt, self-dealing scheme.

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It has actually raised more questions for me than answered them — where this 1.8 billion comes from, the commission, how it's determined, the eligibility — so a lot that we need to know.

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This president has repeatedly spoken of an enemies list that he wants to go after, and I must say it's one of the symbols of the breakdown of a democratic republic.

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After my exchange with Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche today, I do not support the creation of the proposed Anti-Weaponization Fund. No court has approved the settlement agreement and that is why the legal basis for the fund was my first line of questioning for the Attorney General.

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I don't actually see any legal precedent for that. We are a nation of laws, you can't just make up things whole-piece. People are concerned about making their own ends meet, not about putting a slush fund together without a legal precedent.

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Never in the history of the United States has a sitting President sought a monetary settlement from the government he leads — let alone sought many billions of dollars in taxpayer funds. This arrangement creates a specter of corruption unparalleled in American history.

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The machinery of government should never be weaponized against any American, and it is this Department's intention to make right the wrongs that were previously done while ensuring this never happens again. As part of this settlement, we are setting up a lawful process for victims of lawfare and weaponization to be heard and seek redress.

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This administration is dripping with corruption from top to bottom, but rushing a settlement to steal $1.7 billion of taxpayer dollars for a slush fund before a judge can toss your junk lawsuit would be among the most corrupt acts in American political history.

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I would call it one more day in the worst presidency in American history. He's turned the work of the Justice Department to basically fund his allies and lawbreakers on Jan. 6 that attacked the Capitol of the United States, that attacked Capitol police officers in full view of the American people.

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Trump has weaponized the Department of Justice as his personal law office, targeted his perceived political enemies. It is a blatant and obvious conflict for the President to be able to use the administration as his own personal ATM.

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An insane level of corruption — even for Trump. A $1.7 BILLION slush fund for Trump's hand-picked stooges to hand money to January 6th insurrectionists and his political allies.

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Trump's DOJ is funneling your tax dollars to a slush fund to pay off Trump's buddies & allies, like rioters who stormed the Capitol & assaulted police on Jan 6th. An outrageous abuse of power.

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It's bad enough that he pardoned people involved in the first violent attempt to essentially overthrow a free and fair election, but now he wants to pay them. It's obscene, and it's all the more obscene when you consider that people are struggling right now.

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This is outright theft. Trump is stealing $1.7 BILLION of your money to set up a totally unprecedented, first-in-American-history political slush fund that he can use to dole out cash to win loyalty and favors for him and his family.

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This is one of the most brazen examples of corruption we've seen from this administration.

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This is nothing but a racket designed to take $1.7 billion of taxpayer dollars out of the Treasury and pour it into a huge slush fund for Trump at DOJ to hand out to his private militia of insurrectionists, rioters, and white supremacists, including those who brutally beat police officers on January 6, 2021. This is a massive and unprecedented presidential plunder of the American people.

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Trump's slush fund would give nearly $2 BILLION in taxpayer dollars to his supporters, including violent criminals. He's just stealing your money. There's no transparency, we won't know who gets paid, or how much. It's illegal and corrupt as hell. We're fighting it in court.

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Trump suing the IRS was never about justice, it's another self-enrichment scheme on the backs of hard-working taxpayers. Now, with the court poised to weigh in only days from now, Trump is scrambling to cut a backroom deal and solidify his position as the judge, jury, and executioner.

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It is an outrage that the American taxpayers are having to pay for this and that we have a president who is exercising such open corruption in front of everyone and expecting us to go along with it.