Why Trump’s $1.776B DOJ fund is raising alarms | The Excerpt
Why Trump’s $1.776B DOJ fund is raising alarms | The Excerpt
Zulekha Nathoo, USA TODAYFri, May 22, 2026 at 9:10 AM UTC
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On the Friday, May 222, 2026, episode of The Excerpt podcast: What is the Justice Department’s $1.776 billion “anti-weaponization” fund, and who could benefit from it? USA TODAY Justice Correspondent Aysha Bagchi explains how the fund came out of a Trump lawsuit, why legal experts are raising concerns, and what it could mean for January 6 defendants, political donors and taxpayer dollars.
Hit play on the player below to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript beneath it. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.
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Senator Patty Murray:
Do you seriously think this arrangement is appropriate, the President telling the federal government to settle a case and let him pay billions to the people that he chooses?
Todd Blanche:
What you just described wouldn't be appropriate and that's absolutely not what happened and that's not what's happening now. You just set up a series of facts, most of which were not true to say is it-
Senator Patty Murray:
No, they-
Todd Blanche:
No, it's not.
Zulekha Nathoo:
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche went to Capitol Hill this week for a hearing on the Justice Department's budget. But senators quickly zeroed in on something else, a newly announced $1.776 billion anti-weaponization fund. The Justice Department says the money is meant for people who were unjustly targeted. Critics say the fund could potentially reward Trump allies, including some January 6th defendants. Who's right?
Hello and welcome to USA TODAY's The Excerpt. I'm Zulekha Nathoo filling in for Dana Taylor. Today is Friday, May 22, 2026. Today, we're looking at what this fund tells us about the politicization of the Justice Department and the broader fight over its independence. Joining us to dig into all of this is USA TODAY Justice Department correspondent, Aysha Bagchii.
Aysha, thank you so much for joining us.
Aysha Bagchi:
Thanks, Zulekha. I'm happy to be here.
Zulekha Nathoo:
Let's start with the fund itself. How did it come to be set up in the first place and what does the DOJ say its purpose is?
Aysha Bagchi:
This fund came out of a lawsuit that Donald Trump and his two oldest sons and the Trump organization filed against the IRS. It's not the first time that the President has sued the government. This one has to do with a leak of his tax returns that happened previously. He was one of many thousands of people whose tax returns were leaked, especially wealthy individuals by a contractor who had been working at the IRS. Donald Trump sued alleging that the IRS didn't have enough safeguards in place to prevent this from happening. And he sued the government for $10 billion. It was a huge sticker price. What happened in this case is that the Justice Department and Donald Trump came to a settlement. And they came to the settlement without any judicial approval, they basically arrived at the settlement before there was a major response in the case that would've required a judge to approve voluntarily dropping it and letting this settlement go forward.
And the settlement essentially creates this what they call an anti-weaponization fund, $1.776 billion put into a fund that various people can apply to. And there don't seem to be very clear restrictions on who can apply, the terms of the fund say that the Attorney General can pick five commissioners who are going to sit on a commission and decide who gets access to these funds. One of those commissioners will be chosen in consultation with Congress and the President can remove any of those commissioners at will, a new person will then be picked based on the same process that the person dismissed was picked by. It seems to be a fund that will really be run and determined by the priorities of the Attorney General and the President. The Attorney General is of course picked by the President, though in a permanent position, the Attorney General has to get Senate confirmation.
There aren't a lot of restrictions on how the fund will operate. It seems to really be a case in which personnel is policy. Who are these commissioners who are going to be deciding who's been a victim of weaponization by the government and who should have access to these funds?
Zulekha Nathoo:
Just to clarify Trump's case itself, was the case ever going to be moving forward? Would the IRS have been on the hook for that large amount of money?
Aysha Bagchi:
If you talk to any legal expert, they'll tell you $10 billion, very unlikely. Donald Trump was far from the only victim, if you want to say victim, of what happened here. The contractor who leaked his tax returns and many other people's tax returns was criminally prosecuted. There aren't other lawsuits where the IRS has engaged in the settlement for more than a billion dollars to try to deal with someone's tax returns being leaked. It really doesn't seem to be the case that Donald Trump is going to win this lawsuit in any way that would've brought in an enormous amount of money.
And that speaks to one reason people are so critical of what's happened in this case. You essentially have the Justice Department who is run by someone chosen by the President engaging in a deal in what's supposed to be what you say is an adversarial process in the legal system, people who have opposing interests. But here, you've got the DOJ run by someone picked by the President negotiating with the President's own attorneys about how to basically give off what you would think should be the least concessions that the DOJ would want to give. It fights for a lot of cases. It's supposed to represent the government's interests. But here, the DOJ might have the interests of the President in mind as well. That's what makes this case really peculiar and raise these ethical concerns.
Would the DOJ have given this type of deal to anyone else in this situation, especially if they're only thinking of legal defense and not political considerations that aren't a normal part of the judicial process? But it's very unlikely that Donald Trump would've gotten $10 billion or $1.776 billion through this lawsuit.
Zulekha Nathoo:
How is the Justice Department defining people who are unjustly targeted? How clear is that standard?
Aysha Bagchi:
The standard is not clear at all. The settlement talks about this idea of people who were victims of weaponization. Todd Blanche, he was testifying before Congress recently and answered questions about the so called weaponization fund. He said that the funds will not be restricted to people who were prosecuted under the Biden administration. It is true that part of the details on the fund says that there's no partisan requirement that this is a nonpartisan arrangement so there shouldn't be any political qualification, at least that's what's written on paper when it comes to who can be eligible to receive funds here.
But it really is a case where personnel may dictate policy. The Attorney General is the one who's going to be picking the five commissioners who will have a lot of discretion to decide who gets these funds. Under the terms of the deal, that commission is also going to send a quarterly report to the Attorney General so that's another way in which the Attorney General seems to have significant oversight here. Ultimately, the President can remove anyone on the commission. The President seems to have a lot of oversight here and that's a way in which those people seem to have a lot of discretion over who gets these funds. We know the type of people that the President has said are victims of weaponization and that definitely includes the more than 1,500 people who were criminally charged for crimes related to the January 6th, 2021 attack on the Capitol. Most of those people were convicted, not just charged.
Zulekha Nathoo:
And just to be clear, this is taxpayer money. Is that right? You and I are funding this. Is that correct?
Aysha Bagchi:
This is taxpayer money. It's already appropriated through something called the judgment fund, this is money that has been allocated to allow the government to engage in legal settlements. Some of that is pretty normal but it's pretty abnormal how this particular fund is coming about. But it's taxpayer dollars. It's something that everyone is paying for. To the extent that people who committed crimes that many Americans think should have been prosecuted are getting money out of this fund, it's going to come from the American wallet. Yes.
Zulekha Nathoo:
I'm just curious what the political response beyond The Hill has been so far.
Aysha Bagchi:
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There was one prominent resignation that took place in the executive branch, someone named Brian Morrissey. He was the general counsel for the Treasury Department, basically the top legal position, someone confirmed by the Senate just seven months ago. And he resigned right at about the time that this fund was announced, that has sparked some speculation that he may have resigned for this reason. Part of how the fund operates is that the Treasury Department essentially has to create the fund account and certify this money to go into the fund, the $1.776 billion. He did not say that this was the reason he was resigning. He did have a resignation letter that reportedly did thank the President. But the fact that he resigned right at about the same time and he hadn't been very long into his current appointment has fueled some speculation that he's resigning for this reason.
And then you see a lot of uproar from the public about the creation of the fund outside of Congress. It's not clear that is going to stop the fund from going forward but those are things that we're seeing outside The Hill.
Zulekha Nathoo:
In the hearing on Tuesday, lawmakers press Todd Blanche on whether people convicted in connection with January 6th could receive payments. Let's give that a listen.
Senator Chris Van Hollen:
A simple question, will individuals who assaulted Capitol Hill police officers be eligible for this one?
Todd Blanche:
Well, as it makes plain, anybody is-
Senator Chris Van Hollen:
Just let me know if they're eligible for the fund.
Todd Blanche:
As was made plain yesterday, anybody in this country is eligible to apply if they believe they're a victim of weaponization.
Aysha Bagchi:
How did he respond? Todd Blanche did not say that those people are excluded from getting any of these funds. He said there aren't those sorts of limits in place. He was asked specifically about violence against Capitol police officers. He said that there are no limits prohibiting these people from getting the funds. It's really going to be up to the commissioners who are appointed to look at these cases one by one and decide who gets the funds. There aren't any limits in place when it comes to stopping people who committed crimes on January 6th. And in fact, we know that many of those people are people who the President has said he views as victims of weaponization. That's why there is concern that those people may be prime beneficiaries of this fund if it goes forward. But Todd Blanche said there aren't those sorts of restrictions in place. It's going to be up to the commission.
Zulekha Nathoo:
How have Capitol Hill police, some of whom were assaulted on that day, responded?
Aysha Bagchi:
Some of them are very upset. In fact, there's a lawsuit that has already been filed by two Capitol police officers. One of them was someone who very famously is on video footage just being assaulted while he's trying to protect the Capitol from people who were trying to get inside to disrupt the process, that essentially was a process about the peaceful transfer of power from the first Trump presidency to President-elect at the time, Joe Biden. They have filed a lawsuit saying that this weaponization fund is unlawful, that it wasn't authorized, and that it violates a specific constitutional provision that they say prohibits providing funds to support an insurrection against the United States. That's their big argument, very outraged about the idea that people who committed crimes, especially crimes of violence against Capitol police officers may now be getting benefits from the government.
The difficulty many legal experts say that some of these lawsuits may face has to do with a really technical idea, it's something called legal standing. This is basically a requirement beyond the arguments on the law that you have to meet in order to file a lawsuit. You have to show courts that you have a certain type of injury in order for the courts to even listen to you about your lawsuit. And this might be something that people suing about the weaponization fund come up against. These officers are arguing that they've been injured by this fund, even though the funds are just going to other people, because they have faced harassment and even threats for speaking out about what happened on January 6th. And they say that this will further embolden people, it'll fuel more of that type of harassment that could hurt them. That's something that courts are going to listen to but it is an open question whether anyone will have the ability to sue to even argue that the fund is unlawful.
Zulekha Nathoo:
Well, Blanche also did not clearly rule out political donors as potential recipients. And what legal or ethical concerns does that raise?
Aysha Bagchi:
There are some conflict of interest statutes, this is something that lawyers are going to be looking at more closely when it comes to this setup of this fund. But you can quickly imagine what type of ethical concerns there would be. You might have the President personally benefiting the people who have benefited him in a kind of quid pro quo. You can think of almost bribery considerations that would come into place. One of the arguments some people have made about legal concerns when it comes to this fund is a provision of the constitution called the Domestic Emoluments Clause. I know that's a really technical term but basically what that's about is the idea that beyond the President's salary, Presidents are not supposed to be getting benefits from being President. It's the type of provision you have in place to stop corruption, to make sure that things are on the up and up.
And some people are arguing that this fund could violate that. Todd Blanche has said that the President and his family are not going to personally be getting money out of this fund. But even so, some may argue that these are personal benefits if his own friends are the ones who are getting money. It's a way in which there is definitely a concern of the President doing political favors for people who have done political favors for him and to the extent that becomes an increasingly normalized part of our political culture. There are many people who are already concerned about money and politics in different ways but this is just another example in which you can imagine concerns coming up.
Zulekha Nathoo:
As we've noted in previous stories, it's hard to miss the giant Trump banner that was hung on the DOJ building in February. When you step back, what does this hearing tell us about where the Justice Department is headed and how it understands its role under President Trump?
Aysha Bagchi:
This is another example of what has been a growing concern under the current administration about the independence of the Justice Department from the White House. It's not the first time we've seen this concern. One big example is when the President has explicitly called on social media for certain people to be prosecuted, former FBI Director James Comey, New York Attorney General Letitia James, California Democratic Senator Adam Schiff. Adam Schiff has not yet faced charges but he is under investigation. Letitia James and James Comey have both faced charges, some of those charges have been dismissed but we know the DOJ has continued to try to bring new charges against both of them.
These concerns about the blurring of the separation, the distinction between the Justice Department and the President have already been there. And this is another example of that. The President's own lawyers are negotiating with the Justice Department about how to solve a lawsuit that the President filed, and the way that they settled this case without any judicial oversight all on their own is happening in a way that most legal outsiders say wouldn't have happened in any other similar case that didn't involve the President or the President's personal desires or interests.
It is another of these examples where the Justice Department seems to be behaving in a way that is less independent from the White House. Donald Trump has said repeatedly that he feels that the Justice Department under Joe Biden was weaponized against him but there are some important distinctions to understand about what happened under the Joe Biden administration, especially when it comes to prosecutions against Donald Trump. Joe Biden's Attorney General, Merrick Garland, actually appointed a special counsel. This is a role that basically allows a prosecutor to have greater than normal independence from the Justice Department. He appointed Jack Smith who looked into the Trump cases and ultimately brought two prosecutions against the President. And he didn't just do that when it came to Donald Trump. He did that when it came to an investigation of Joe Biden. He did that when it came to an investigation... Multiple investigations of Hunter Biden, Joe Biden's son. A special counsel brought two criminal cases against Hunter Biden. A separate special counsel decided not to bring a case against Joe Biden and explained himself in a report.
Donald Trump has said that a similar type of... Well, he said that a weaponization has happened against him under the Joe Biden administration. But there were safeguards in place, processes to try to prevent that interaction between the President and people who are making charging decisions. And that is something that it seems is wearing down under the current administration. And this is another example where it seems to be the case that the Justice Department is having less and less independents to operate in the normal ways that it should be operating in any type of case.
There are plenty of other people who may argue that their tax returns were unlawfully leaked. That's actually the case, many people's tax returns beyond Donald Trump were leaked when they were stolen. And there are plenty of other types of lawsuits that Americans bring against their government all the time, the question is whether everyone is treated in a similar way where their actions are evaluated independently by prosecutors who are trying to enforce the law equally for everyone. This is another example in which those sorts of safeguards seem to be wearing down in some ways and we're going to have to see what comes next and really what'll happen with the Justice Department going beyond this precedential term. It's a department that's also lost thousands of attorneys under the current administration. It only had thousands of attorneys to start with, a significant chunk are gone. There are a lot of changes happening at the Justice Department. I cover the Justice Department so maybe I'm biased but I think it's definitely an area that many people should be watching.
Zulekha Nathoo:
Well, thank you for breaking this all down for us. Aysha Bagchii is a justice department correspondent with USA TODAY. Aysha, thanks for being with us today.
Aysha Bagchi:
Thanks. I was happy to be here.
Zulekha Nathoo:
Thanks for listening. I'm Zulekha Nathoo filling in for Dana Taylor.
Thanks to our Senior Producer, Kaely Monahan for her production assistance. Our Executive Producer is Laura Beatty.
Let us know what you think of this episode by sending a note to podcasts@usatoday.com.
Thanks for listening. I'm Zulekha Nathoo. We'll be back Monday morning with another episode of USA TODAY's The Excerpt.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Could Jan 6th rioters benefit from Trump’s DOJ fund?
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