(Luis Cornelio, Headline USA) Millions in legal fees. Felony charges. Thousands of combined years in prison sentences. Hours of interrogations. Hundreds of subpoenas. Careers ruined.
That is the scale of what thousands of conservative activists and organizations endured through years of federal investigations under the Biden administration.
Now, they are set to be compensated under a $1.776 billion fund announced Monday by President Donald Trump and the Department of Justice.
The fund is part of a settlement between Trump, the Department of the Treasury and the IRS after former IRS contractor Charles Littlejohn leaked Trump’s tax returns to the media.
The fund will be overseen by a five-member board appointed by the attorney general, with one member selected in consultation with lawmakers, according to the DOJ.
The department said participation in the claims process will be voluntary and open to eligible applicants, with no partisan requirements to file.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche praised the settlement and the creation of the fund.
“The machinery of government should never be weaponized against any American, and it is this Department’s intention to make right the wrongs that were previously done while ensuring this never happens again,” Blanche said.
“As part of this settlement, we are setting up a lawful process for victims of lawfare and weaponization to be heard and seek redress,” he added.
The DOJ said the fund was modeled after a $760 million program established during the Obama administration to redress claims of discrimination within the federal government.
Any unclaimed funds will be returned to the federal government, unlike the Obama-era program, which redirected remaining funds to outside organizations.
However, nearly 100 Democrats in the House of Representatives have signed onto a legal brief urging a judge to block what they described as an unprecedented resolution that they said would unjustly enrich people close to the president and open the door to meritless claims of political persecution.
“Let’s call this what it is: a billion-dollar slush fund for Trump to reward felons, insurrectionists, and cronies, paid for by YOUR taxpayer dollars,” Democratic Sen. Chris Coons, a member of the subcommittee from Delaware, wrote on X. “It’s bad enough that this DOJ believes it works for Donald Trump. Now, it’s giving him its budget to use as his piggy bank.”
