WASHINGTON — Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) introduced legislation Wednesday to block President Donald Trump's $1.8 billion "Anti-Weaponization Fund" that could offer payouts to Jan. 6 rioters and other supposed victims of "lawfare" by previous administrations. The Justice Department, now led by Trump loyalists, agreed to create this pot of taxpayer money for the president in exchange for his settling a private lawsuit seeking $10 billion from his own administration. Experts have called this fund "patently unlawful."
Raskin's bill, the No Taxpayer-Funded Settlement Slush Funds Act, would bar payments for Jan. 6 defendants or people prosecuted for foreign interference in the 2016 election, or to anyone whose case has already been dismissed with prejudice, meaning it can't be tried again. It would also prohibit settlement payments to the president, the vice president, their immediate family members, Cabinet officials, top administration officials and political appointees.
This legislation would "shut down this highway robbery and restore basic guardrails on how taxpayer dollars are spent," Raskin said in a statement.
"Trump is trying to commandeer nearly $1.8 billion in taxpayer funds to bankroll a slush fund for January 6 cop-beaters and aggrieved MAGA foot soldiers," he said. "This massive abuse of public money also has glaring constitutional defects: only Congress has the power to appropriate federal dollars, and we didn't appropriate a cent for the J6 millionaire trust fund."
Raskin's bill would also require the Treasury Department to report to Congress all settlement payments exceeding $100,000, and authorize the U.S. attorney general to seek civil action to recover any improperly disbursed funds. It also prohibits the creation of future presidential slush funds.
Raskin unveiled his bill hours after he forced the House Judiciary Committee to vote on subpoenaing the Trump administration officials setting up the slush fund. The top Democrat on the committee, he made a motion to subpoena Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, IRS Chief Executive Officer Frank Bisignano and Treasury Department General Counsel Brian Morrissey.
"These individuals all possess critical insights into Trump's self-dealing scheme with his own agencies to create this fund and reward his supporters and friends," the Maryland Democrat appealed to his GOP colleagues.
His effort narrowly failed; Republicans voted to table Raskin's motion in an 18–17 party-line vote. But curiously, one lawmaker voted with Raskin and other Democrats who isn't in their party: Rep. Kevin Kiley, a Republican-turned-independent member from California.
Trump's DOJ fund is certainly raising a lot of eyebrows, even causing discomfort for top Republicans on Capitol Hill. Two police officers who were injured in the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, sued the administration over it on Wednesday, calling it "stunningly, blindingly illegal." And when Senate Republicans take up their budget reconciliation package later this week — aka their $72 billion spending bill for ICE, CBP and Trump's $1 billion White House ballroom — Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) plans to make them squirm over the slush fund.
Van Hollen will offer an amendment to prevent child molesters and criminals who assaulted police officers — a number of convicted Jan. 6 rioters fall into both categories — from getting payouts under Trump's fund, an effort to force his GOP colleagues to choose between supporting child sex offenders and supporting restrictions on the use of the president's fund.
"It's time to see where Republicans stand," he said in a statement.
