President Donald Trump indicated Saturday he would not waver on the controversial “anti-weaponization” fund that has threatened Todd Blanche’s nomination for attorney general.
Trump said on Truth Social he would “push hard” to get congressional approval for the $1.8 billion pool of money — a fund that Blanche signed off on as part of the president’s settlement against the IRS.
That approval would be nearly impossible to attain in the current environment: Critics from both sides of the aisle have raised concerns about offering payouts to people who participated in the Jan. 6 Capitol riots and other Trump allies.
Chief among the dissenters are outgoing Sens. John Cornyn (R–Texas) and Thom Tillis (R–North Carolina), who have withheld voting for Blanche until they have receive written guarantees that the Justice Department will kill the fund. Trump accused the duo of retaliating after the president refused to back their reelection campaigns earlier this year.
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“It will immediately be back on the table,” Trump said of the fund, “and I will get it done.”
Trump, his two eldest sons and the Trump Organization appealed the ruling on Friday to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in hopes of blocking the ruling a federal judge made earlier this month that Trump and the Justice Department had manipulated the judicial process to benefit the president and his allies.
Trump repeated on Saturday he was willing to leave Blanche as acting attorney general until Cornyn and Tillis are out of office next year. Senate Judiciary Chair Chuck Grassley (R–Iowa) rescheduled a vote for Blanche on Tuesday, but Cornyn and Tillis have signaled they will not change their positions.
“President Trump clearly intends to resurrect the payout pot for punks either by inappropriately establishing another bogus fund or pushing Congress to vote for a bill that the majority of Republicans in the Senate would be against,” Tillis wrote on Saturday in response to Trump. “It’s unfortunate that Todd Blanche, who I consider qualified for the job, will not be confirmed because of this reversal.”
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