BOOM!

Photo: Associated Press

That wasn’t a supersonic jet crashing through the sound barrier you just heard. It was Trump’s billion dollar “ask” for his ballroom blowing up. It’s gone, done, finito. Ain’t gonna happen. Over the weekend, the Senate Parliamentarian ruled that the money for Trump’s ballroom didn’t fit within the Senate’s rules for the filibuster-proof reconciliation bill appropriation for immigration. What the hell the ballroom was doing in the immigration bill in the first place wasn’t addressed in the ruling. The ruling prompted a not insignificant explosion from Trump, who demanded that Majority Leader John Thune fire the parliamentarian, which hasn’t happened. Republicans are said to be looking for another way to fund the ballroom, but as the days tick by and the midterm elections approach and the cost of living keeps going up for everything from beef to gas to potato chips, fewer Republicans are expressing much enthusiasm for Trump’s gold plated dream that not a single ordinary citizen will ever see the inside of.

Today, Senators meeting for lunch to discuss the immigration bill faced another problem. Democrats are expected to propose an amendment that would make an issue of Trump’s $1.8 billion “weaponization” fund. Republicans will probably be able to shoot down the amendment, but the issue is not dead.

Also today, two police officers who defended the Capitol during the Jan. 1, 2021 insurrection filed suit in federal court to block the administration of Trump’s plan to commit legal theft from the taxpayers. Metropolitan Police Department officer Daniel Hodges and former U.S. Capitol Police officer Harry Dunn called the Trump plan to lavish money on Capital rioters “the most brazen act of presidential corruption this century” and a “slush fund,” which it obviously is.

The money for the “weaponization” fund is supposed to come out of the Judgement Fund, money which is appropriated by the Congress to pay legal claims from lawsuits filed against the government. The problem the Trump “weaponization” fund faces is that it will be administered not by the DOJ but by a third party, a special commission with four members appointed by the Attorney General and one member appointed by Congress. The president would be empowered to remove any of the commissioners, even the one appointed by Congress, without cause.

In other words, “weaponization” money from the Judgement Fund will not need to be ordered by a court to be paid to people who have sued the government and won a judgement, which appears to violate the terms of the appropriations law written by Congress establishing the Judgement Fund.

As the cops who were injured by January 6 insurrectionists said, it’s a slush fund to pay off Trump’s pals, plain and simple, with no rules that need to be followed. Trump’s “commissioners,” whoever they are, will be able to pay any amount of money to any person who makes an application claiming the law had been “weaponized” against them, even if they voluntarily pleaded guilty to charges against them, as many of those convicted of January 6 offenses did. Plea agreements in such cases usually involved reduced charges and lesser sentences, often drawing no jail time. But all such plea agreements normally bar the signers from appealing the conviction or attempting to recover restitution from the government.

The case of Michael Flynn, Trump’s first national security adviser who was convicted of lying to the FBI about his contacts with Russians during the 2016 campaign, is instructive. Flynn pleaded guilty to “willfully and knowingly making false and fictitious statements to the FBI.” There then ensued a multi-year clusterfuck as Flynn sought leniency for cooperating with the FBI. His pleadings included a deal for his son not to be charged for crimes he had committed. Flynn also filed for delays in sentencing, his lawyer claiming that there was “information implicating the president” that made the sentencing a “national security issue.”

On and on the Flynn filings went. He fired his original attorneys and hired Sidney “Kraken” Powell, who lost her license to practice due to her outrageous behavior during the phony 2020 election lawsuits she filed. Powell convinced Flynn to withdraw his guilty plea. Flynn was pardoned by Trump in November of 2020 before he left office. He sued the Department of Justice in 2023 for $50 million and settled his case after Trump took office again in 2026 for $1.2 million.

That money came from the DOJ Judgement Fund. Flynn had sued for malicious prosecution, so the agreement he reached with the DOJ to drop the suit and take the $1.2 million payment had to be approved by the judge overseeing his lawsuit.

Exactly ZERO of the insurrectionists convicted of offenses committed on January 6 would come under anything even approximating Flynn’s situation. None have moved to change their pleas after pleading guilty as Flynn did. None have filed lawsuits claiming malicious prosecution, so the government has not lost any lawsuits in court with a judge ordering the government to pay the plaintiffs from the Judgement Fund.

None of this has even a hint of following the law as it has been applied in the past when money from the Judgement Fund has been paid out to plaintiffs who have sued the government, as was mandated when Congress appropriated money for the Judgement Fund.

What Trump wants to do with his “weaponization” fund is steal money from taxes paid by citizens to pay off his friends who attempted to overturn his election loss in 2020 and get them ready for anything he wants them to do in either 2026 or 2028…or in the coming years, for that matter.

There will be lawsuits against Trump’s “weaponization” fund, but Reuters is reporting that legal experts say that it will be difficult to find people with legal standing to file suit against the fund. Either or both houses of Congress could sue to stop payments, but that isn’t going to happen with Republicans running Congress.

That might change in 2027 if Democrats take over either the House or Senate or both. Until then, we have a gangster in the White House and he’s going to steal all the money he can to give it away to fellow criminals and build monuments to himself. That’s where we are, folks.