Judge Indefinitely Blocks Slush Fund for Trump Supporters

Donald Trump’s efforts to reward people who committed crimes on his behalf with lavish payments took a massive hit on Friday when a federal judge permanently blocked the creation of the slush fund that the president wanted to use to pay individuals such as those convicted of storming Congress to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

In order to ensure that taxpayers would foot the bill for this scheme, the fund was part of a “settlement” between Trump himself, Trump’s IRS, and Trump’s Department of Justice that also prevented past tax filings of the president, his family, and his businesses from being investigated for fraud.

Because that is as suspect as it sounds, District Judge Leonie Brinkema had temporarily blocked the creation of that fund last month.

At a hearing on Friday, the government argued that a lawsuit challenging one of Trump’s pet projects was now moot because acting Attorney General Todd Blanche had testified before Congress that the administration would not be moving forward with establishing the fund.

Brinkema wasn’t swayed… perhaps in part because Blanche told lawmakers that he would not put it in writing that it was truly dead, perhaps because Trump himself called the fund a “great idea” last week, or perhaps because everybody in his administration lies a lot.

As a result, she indefinitely extended her order blocking the establishment of the fund and allowed the underlying lawsuit to proceed.

Democracy Forward, the advocacy organization that brought the suit on behalf of the plaintiffs, celebrated Brinkema’s decision.

“This ruling is a significant victory for the Constitution, the rule of law, and people in America,” said the group’s President and CEO Skye Perryman. “The court recognized the serious legal concerns raised by the Trump-Vance administration’s attempt to create a secretive, taxpayer-funded compensation program operating outside the constitutional safeguards that govern public spending. Despite the administration’s shifting explanations about the future of the slush fund, the court’s order ensures that taxpayer dollars cannot be distributed through this unlawful scheme while the courts fully consider the serious constitutional issues at stake.”

Brinkema offered the administration an out to end the litigation. The judge suggested that she is inclined to dismiss the lawsuit if, under penalty of perjury, Blanche and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent say that the project is truly dead and won’t resurface in some other way.

That seems like a very reasonable ask… unless they are scheming to revive the project somehow.

And even if that were their intention, Blanche and Bessent would be smart to make such a statement. Otherwise, the lawsuit would proceed to the fact-finding phase, and we sincerely doubt that they, and Trump, are interested in having their fishy arrangement scrutinized in that way.