The Trump administration’s $1.776 billion fund — formally called the “anti-weaponization” fund and created through a settlement of Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service — was unveiled May 18 by acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, Trump’s former criminal defense lawyer. It is designed to provide monetary relief and formal apologies to individuals who, in the department’s judgment, were victims of a “weaponized” government under the Biden administration. According to the Justice Department, anyone can submit a claim and there are “no partisan requirements,” but critics say the fund is effectively a mechanism to reward Trump’s political allies and people involved in the Capitol attack.
The fund has been challenged on multiple legal fronts. On May 29, a federal judge in Virginia issued a temporary restraining order blocking the fund’s establishment and any disbursements until at least a June 12 hearing, in response to a lawsuit filed by a former January 6 prosecutor fired by the Trump administration and other individuals who say they have faced administration attacks. The Justice Department said June 1 that it would “abide by” the order.
Separately, a group of 35 former federal judges — spanning both Republican and Democratic administrations — filed a motion May 27 in the Miami federal court that had overseen Trump’s IRS lawsuit, asking the judge to reopen the case and investigate whether the settlement and fund creation involved fraud. Judge Aileen Cannon, who handled the case, granted the motion May 29 and reopened the matter to explore whether the court “had been deceived” by the parties.
Axios reported June 1, citing two unnamed sources, that the fund “for now” was dead. Trump told ABC News, “We are subject to the courts,” adding, “At this moment, that’s what it is … If a court doesn’t allow it, and right now a court has it held up, what can you do?”
The fund has drawn unusually sharp criticism from members of both parties. Republican Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina told CNN’s “State of the Union” on May 24 that the fund’s purpose of paying for “anti-weaponization” efforts was “stupid on stilts” and called it “a payout pot for punks.” Tillis said the fund should not benefit “people who are convicted by a jury of their peers or pled guilty to assaulting a police officer.”
Former Vice President Mike Pence, who broke with Trump after January 6, called the fund “deeply offensive” in interviews on CBS and NBC on May 31 and urged the administration to “drop the idea entirely.” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, a Democrat, wrote to colleagues that the fund is “Trump’s most brazen act of self-dealing yet.” Republican Congressman Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania and Democratic Congressman Tom Suozzi of New York are drafting legislation to block the fund entirely.
Two police officers who were attacked by rioters on January 6 have filed a lawsuit seeking to halt the fund. Meanwhile, several far-right allies of Trump, including Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio, have publicly indicated they plan to seek payments.
Former DOJ officials and legal scholars have sharply criticized the fund’s legality and structure. Michael Bromwich, a former DOJ inspector general, said “Everything about the $1.776bn fund is crazy and corrupt,” citing the amount of money, the broad definition of eligible claimants, and the lack of transparency. He called it “an attempted political payoff to criminals” that is “wide open to people who committed crimes of violence on Trump’s behalf.”
Donald Ayer, a former deputy attorney general under President George H.W. Bush, said the fund amounts to “outright theft.” He said the fund’s addendum — which blocks IRS action on any pending tax probes of Trump, his sons and their businesses — constitutes a “blank check immunity from IRS inquiries” that “can only happen when due process and the rule of law have failed.”
Barbara McQuade, a former U.S. attorney for eastern Michigan who now teaches at the University of Michigan, said the fund is “a blatant example of self-dealing corruption that not only enriches Trump’s political allies, but also advances the false political narrative that the Biden administration engaged in lawfare.” She said that if the fund is used to reward people convicted of violent crimes in connection with January 6, “it will send a message that vigilante violence is welcome as long as it aids the party in power.”
Bruce Green, a former federal prosecutor who now teaches at Fordham University, said the fund “stands the rule of law and democracy on its head” because the executive branch is unilaterally drawing nearly $2 billion from the Treasury “without a congressional appropriation” and as part of the settlement of a “collusive lawsuit” that the government “never answered but certainly could have defended.”
Mimi Rocah, a former federal prosecutor now teaching at Fordham, said the fund is “based on a myth that people seem too willing to accept: that the Biden DOJ was improperly bringing cases against all sorts of people it shouldn’t have. That didn’t happen.”
In an ironic twist, CNN reported May 26 that several Trump foes he has targeted for retaliation — including fired former Capitol riot prosecutors and former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe — are weighing whether to file claims with the fund. Bromwich told CNN that McCabe is “strongly considering” applying. No payments have been made, and the fund remains frozen pending the court hearing scheduled for June 12.