The U.S. Department of Justice has introduced an “anti-weaponization fund” that will be used to provide financial compensation to people who say they have been unfairly targeted by the federal government.
The fund, announced Monday, is part of a settlement arising from a lawsuit President Donald Trump filed against the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) earlier this year for leaking tax information.
How was the Anti-Weaponization Fund born?
From 2018 to 2020, President Trump’s tax information was leaked to the New York Times. Charles Edward Littlejohn, a former IRS contractor, was accused of filing these tax returns in 2023, according to a statement from the U.S. Department of Justice. Citing tax returns, the Times reported in 2020 that Trump, a billionaire, had paid little or no federal income taxes for 15 years.
The IRS is the U.S. government’s revenue agency responsible for collecting federal taxes and enforcing tax laws.
Littlejohn pleaded guilty to disclosing restitution and was sentenced to five years in prison in 2024.
In January, Mr. Trump sued the IRS and Treasury Department, parts of his government, for $10 billion, accusing the agencies of failing to prevent the leaking of his tax information.
On Tuesday, the Attorney General’s Office in Washington, D.C., announced the creation of an “anti-weaponization fund” as part of a settlement agreement between the two sides.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, appointed by President Trump, was quoted as saying in a Justice Department news release issued Monday that “government agencies should never be weaponized against any American citizen, and it is the Department of Justice’s intent to right the wrongs done in the past and ensure that nothing like this ever happens again.”
“As part of this settlement, we are establishing a legal process for victims of illegal conduct and weapons use to be heard and seek redress.”
How does the fund work?
The fund is expected to receive just under $1.8 billion, which will come from a separate Judgment Fund, a standing government account through which the U.S. government pays out legal settlements and court judgments without requiring a vote of Congress each time.
Anyone who believes they have been harmed by an unfair legal action by the federal government can seek compensation from the new fund by filing a claim.
The fund is supposed to issue a report to the attorney general every three months, including details on who received payments or relief and whether they were cash payments, debt relief or other compensation.
The fund will be overseen by a five-person team appointed by the Attorney General. One member of the committee will be appointed in consultation with Congressional leaders.
The fund will operate until December 1, 2028, after which it will stop accepting new claims.
The fund was established as part of a settlement with the Department of Justice and has already been approved by a federal judge, so no further approval is required to begin operations. But critics are calling for Congress to intervene.
Why is this fund so controversial?
Some Democratic lawmakers oppose the creation of the fund, and some legal experts argue that using legal settlements to create such a large compensation program pushes the limits of the executive branch’s authority.
They said they believed the funds would eventually be used to pay back Trump supporters who rioted at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and who were later pardoned by Trump himself.
On January 6, 2021, thousands of rioters, fueled by false claims that the 2020 presidential election was rigged against President Trump, stormed the Capitol in an attempt to stop the certification of Democrat Joe Biden’s victory.
More than 2,000 people invaded the U.S. Capitol, vandalizing offices and clashing with police. Five people were killed and others injured.
About 1,270 people were convicted of federal crimes related to the riot, with prison terms ranging from a few years to more than 20 years in the case of leaders of far-right groups.
On the day of his second term inauguration last January, President Trump pardoned or commuted the sentences of 1,500 people convicted or charged in connection with the riot, calling the treatment “outrageous.”
More than 90 Democratic members of the House have filed legal papers seeking to block the new fund, according to a news release Monday from the office of one of those Democrats, Rep. Seth Moulton.
“This taxpayer-funded pool is intended to compensate individuals who claim to have been ‘persecuted’ by the previous administration, and specifically targets payments to January 6 convicts and participants in the ‘fake elector’ conspiracy.”
Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat, described the fund in the X-Post as “a $1.7 billion slush fund for Trump’s hand-picked stooges to channel funds to the January 6th insurrectionists and their political allies.”
Warren called the fund “an outrageous level of corruption, even for Trump.”
The size of the fund also sparked debate. At $1.8 billion, the fund is equivalent to the annual police and school budgets of a mid-sized U.S. city. This is far more than the amount normally associated with a single lawsuit.
Why do critics call this a “slush fund”?
“Trump deserves no credit for dropping this case. He’s doing it to set up a $1.7 billion slush fund for right-wing political violence. If Trump follows through, it will be the most brazen theft of tax dollars in history,” Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden wrote in the X-Post on Monday.
A slush fund is an unregulated fund used for secret and even illegal purposes.
The Cato Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank, released an analysis on Wednesday titled “Trump’s Anti-Weaponization Fund Is (Another) Slut Fund.”
The report said creating new spending programs without Congressional approval fits the Trump administration’s established pattern of improvising ways for Trump to circumvent Congress.
How is the Trump administration defending this?
The acting attorney general argued that the fund is similar to one established under former Democratic President Barack Obama. “This was done during the Obama administration, and structurally it’s pretty much the same,” Blanche told the Senate Appropriations subcommittee Tuesday, adding, “It’s true that this is unusual. That’s true, but it’s not unprecedented.”
Blanche was referring to the 2011 Keepsigle v. Vilsack settlement, which provided compensation to Native American farmers and ranchers. Adjusted for inflation, the Keepsigle Compensation Fund, approximately $680 million from 2011, would be worth approximately $1 billion today.
After the funds were used to pay approved claims, the settlement distributed hundreds of millions of dollars to nonprofits and NGOs that did not file claims.
This week, the Justice Department announced that if any money remains in the new fund after Dec. 1, 2028, it will be redirected to the federal government.
“The analogy that was drawn in that case is completely inaccurate,” PBS News quoted lead attorney Joseph Sellers, who represented the Native American plaintiffs in the case, as saying.
He said this is because Trump v. IRS is not a class action lawsuit.
Legal experts also argued that, unlike the Keepsigle settlement, the new fund would operate with little judicial oversight.
