President Donald Trump spent the weekend hanging his own attorney general nominee out to dry to protect his slush fund, according to conservative commentator Erick Erickson.
Writing Monday, the longtime conservative radio host tore into Trump’s handling of Todd Blanche, the acting attorney general whom Trump nominated to run the Justice Department permanently. Blanche’s confirmation stalled for weeks after GOP Sens. John Cornyn (R-TX) and Thom Tillis (R-NC), both leaving Congress in November, refused to advance it until the administration killed a $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” fund in writing.
That fund, created through a settlement of Trump’s lawsuit over his leaked tax returns, would steer taxpayer money to Trump allies and Jan. 6 rioters who claim they were wrongly prosecuted. Erickson griped that Trump would not surrender it, even as it sank his own nominee.
“Blanche is left holding a promise his boss refuses to keep,” Erickson wrote.
He added: “And here the President should think like the politician he claims to be, because he is walking into a trap of his own making. If he yanks Blanche’s nomination and parks it until after the midterms, he does not make the problem go away. He hands the Democrats a fresh line to run on.”
Trump had conceded the fund was finished while making plain he resented losing it.
“It is dead, but you know, I wish it weren’t,” he said at a recent Cabinet meeting. He also threatened to keep Blanche in an acting role and push the fund through Congress if the Senate would not confirm him.
Late Sunday, Blanche formally rescinded the fund in a one-page order, clearing a path to a Tuesday committee vote. But a report from the progressive group MeidasTouch argued the fine print quietly preserved Trump’s own IRS audit immunity, claiming he was willing to sacrifice the Jan. 6 defendants while shielding himself.
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