Trump Settlement Creates $1.8 Billion Fund for Claims of Weaponized Legal System

Washington — The Justice Department’s new $1.776 billion fund to pay people who say the legal system was weaponized against them drew immediate questions about its legality and how it will work.

The department said there are no partisan requirements for seeking compensation. Past settlements and statements from Trump allies suggest the president’s highest-profile supporters may stand to benefit.

The fund was created as part of a settlement between Mr. Trump and the Internal Revenue Service to end a civil lawsuit he and his sons filed in January over the leak of his tax returns. The program is meant to give a process for hearing and paying claims of weaponization and lawfare.

The money will come from the Judgment Fund, which Congress created in 1956 to pay court judgments and settlements against the government. Congress removed the original $100,000 cap in the mid-1970s.

Neither the Justice Department nor the White House has said who will be eligible or whether payouts will have a limit. The settlement calls for a five-member commission, with four members named by Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and one chosen after consulting congressional leaders.

Blanche told a Senate hearing Tuesday that the commission will decide who can receive money and how much.

Ethics groups and lawmakers on Capitol Hill quickly condemned the plan. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington called the settlement the most brazen act of self-dealing in presidential history and said it likely violates the Constitution’s Domestic Emoluments Clause.

Two U.S. Capitol Police officers filed a lawsuit Wednesday to block the fund. They said payouts to people involved in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack would raise their risk of vigilante violence and continued threats.

The officers and others who want to challenge the fund face a major hurdle: proving they have standing to sue. The Supreme Court has ruled that taxpayers generally cannot challenge government spending simply because they pay taxes.

Paul Figley, a law professor at American University, said courts would not let someone sue over a large settlement just because they think the government paid too much.

Figley said the program appears legal but is poor policy because the executive branch created it without Congress setting rules for how the money will be spent.

The federal government has run other settlement programs, such as the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund and the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. Those programs were created by Congress and include strict safeguards.

Rupa Bhattacharyya, legal director at Georgetown Law School, said it is unusual for taxpayer money to be paid out without clear rules. She called it insane to use appropriated funds this way without criteria set by the Justice Department or Congress.

The Justice Department pointed to a 2011 settlement with Native American farmers and ranchers as precedent. That case left hundreds of millions of dollars unspent, and a court later approved using some of the money to create the Native American Agriculture Fund.

Joseph Sellers, who represented the Native American plaintiffs, said the key difference is that a federal court oversaw how the money was spent. He said he knows of no other case where the parties negotiated a payout process with no transparency or judicial oversight.

Republican and Democratic lawmakers have raised concerns. Senate Majority Leader John Thune said he is not a big fan of the program and sees no purpose for it. Maine Sen. Susan Collins said the fund raises important questions and should not move forward without more scrutiny.

Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin tried to subpoena Justice and Treasury officials about the settlement. He also introduced legislation to bar payments tied to claims from the Jan. 6 attack and foreign interference in the 2016 election.

Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen said he will offer an amendment to block violent criminals and child molesters from receiving money from the fund.