The Justice Department recently announced a $1.776 billion fund designed to compensate people who claim they were targeted by Joe Biden‘s Justice Department and Democrats as victims of “weaponization and lawfare.” Congressman Jamie Raskin (D-MD) has strongly opposed the move, calling it “thoroughly illegal and unconstitutional.”
The fund, called the Anti-Weaponization Fund, is part of a settlement between Trump and the Justice Department. In exchange for dropping his $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS over his leaked tax returns, Trump agreed to set up the fund. The money will come from a “special, unlimited account available to the Justice Department for settling lawsuits.”
This account has traditionally been used for settling lawsuits or paying court verdicts. But according to Mediaite, Raskin says Trump has now turned it into a “political slush fund” for his political allies, including people convicted in connection with the January 6 Capitol riot.
Trump’s use of the Justice Department judgment fund raises serious constitutional concerns
Raskin told MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow that the fund, known as the “judgment fund,” is meant for “actual judgments, verdicts, damages levied by a court against the United States or an honest, good faith settlement of claims that would have won in court.” He pointed out that Congress never voted to create a $1.776 billion political fund for the president. “So it’s a complete violation of Congressional appropriations powers,” he stated.
Raskin also argued that even if Congress had wanted to do this, it would still be unconstitutional. “The 14th Amendment says that money cannot be spent out of the federal fisc for the purposes of repaying people for insurrection or rebellion against the United States,” he said.
He blasted the fund as an “outrageous expropriation of the tax dollars of the people for political purposes to give to Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, rioters and insurrectionists, the people who beat up police officers.” Trump’s financial decisions have drawn scrutiny beyond this fund, as seen in how the Iran conflict affected American household finances.
Raskin further challenged the idea that the people receiving money from this fund had legitimate legal claims. “If these people had real, viable causes of action against anybody, they would go to federal court,” he said.
“And the ones who have gone to federal court have lost their cases, overwhelmingly. And you can’t find a single case of somebody whose criminal conviction was reversed on appeal after they assaulted a police officer on January 6 or were convicted for seditious conspiracy.”
Raskin also criticized the oversight committee set up to manage the fund, which he said would be “exclusively responsible” to Trump. He called Trump the “chairman for life” of the Board of Peace, with “unchecked financial control.”
He also noted that the fund will stop processing claims by December 15, 2028, just one month before Trump’s second term is set to end. When asked whether people who committed violence against Capitol Police should qualify for compensation, Trump said “it’ll all be dependent on a committee being set up of very talented people, very highly respected people.”
The fund has drawn strong criticism from Democrats. Rep. Joe Neguse (D-Colo.) called it “one of the most brazen examples of corruption we’ve seen from this administration.” This is part of a broader pattern of the administration dismissing scientific and factual consensus on key issues. The House Democrats’ Litigation Task Force has filed a motion to block the move, which Raskin described as “pure fraud and highway robbery.”
Published: May 20, 2026 06:15 am