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\n

Acting attorney general Todd Blanche told Sen. John Cornyn of Texas that while the anti-weaponization fund is \u201cdead,\u201d the underlying settlement agreement remains an \u201cenforceable document.\u201d<\/p>\n

A critical Republican vote needed for Blanche\u2019s attorney general nomination to advance out of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Cornyn appeared at the Wednesday confirmation hearing accompanied by a poster-sized version of President Donald Trump\u2019s settlement agreement with the IRS.<\/p>\n

Cornyn pointed to page four, which states that \u201cthis settlement agreement may be modified only upon the written agreement of the parties.\u201d<\/p>\n

Blanche replied that there has not been a written agreement to modify the settlement fund while emphasizing that \u201cit\u2019s not moving forward\u201d after sharp backlash from members of both parties, fearful it would be a slush fund to make payments to Trump\u2019s political allies and rioters involved in the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol attacks.<\/p>\n

The settlement agreement, however, remains an \u201cenforceable document,\u201d Blanche acknowledged, noting that Trump\u2019s counsel could potentially seek to enforce the contract by a breach of contract lawsuit.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey can\u2019t force the Department of Justice to move forward with the weaponization fund,\u201d Blanche said. \u201cThey could potentially say that, I suppose, that we breached by not moving forward,\u201d but added, \u201cThey haven’t done that and I’m not aware that they’re planning on doing that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cornyn has said he needs assurances from Blanche that there is no way the anti-weaponization fund could ever go into effect. It\u2019s not clear whether Blanche\u2019s response will be satisfactory toward that end. A single Republican vote against Blanche in committee could thwart his chances of being confirmed, assuming all Democrats vote \u201cno.\u201d<\/p>\n

The $1.8 billion \u201canti-weaponization fund\u201d originally floated by the Justice Department was born out of a settlement of a $10 billion lawsuit Trump brought against the IRS for leaking his tax information. The other outcome of that settlement was the guarantee of IRS immunity for Trump, his business and family members \u2014 also a subject of intense scrutiny from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.<\/p>\n

Blanche noted earlier in the Wednesday confirmation hearing that the IRS audit shield is \u201cnot an exemption to comply with the tax laws of the United States,\u201d but \u201can agreement that any past audits would end.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Acting attorney general Todd Blanche told Sen. John Cornyn of Texas that while the anti-weaponization fund is \u201cdead,\u201d the underlying settlement agreement remains an \u201cenforceable document.\u201d A critical Republican vote needed for Blanche\u2019s attorney general nomination to advance out of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Cornyn appeared at the Wednesday confirmation hearing accompanied by a poster-sized […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25889","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-congress"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25889","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25889"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25889\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25889"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25889"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25889"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}