Brian Morrissey is not the kind of person usually described as hostile to Donald Trump. He is a Trump appointee, clerked for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and previously served in Trump’s first administration. By almost every traditional Washington standard, he is considered a loyalist.
Morrissey resigned from his position as the Treasury Department’s top lawyer just hours after the administration unveiled a $1.776 billion fund that critics are already describing as one of the most blatant corruption scandals in modern presidential politics.
The fund, officially called the Anti Weaponization Fund, was announced by acting Attorney General Todd Blanche as part of a deal resolving Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS over the leaking of his tax returns during his first term.
The setup behind it quickly became a major point of criticism.
Stay up-to-date with the latest news!
Subscribe and start recieving our daily emails.
The Treasury Department will place $1.776 billion into an account overseen by a five member commission appointed entirely by Blanche, who previously served as Trump’s personal criminal defense attorney before becoming the country’s top law enforcement official.
And the details somehow became even stranger from there.
Buried inside the fund agreement is a disclaimer stating the administration carries “no liability whatsoever for the protection or safeguarding of those funds, regardless of bank failure, fraudulent transfers, or any other fraud or misuse of the funds.”
The administration essentially created a legal escape hatch for problems tied to the same fund it designed.
Criticism arrived from nearly every corner of the Democratic Party.
Senator Elizabeth Warren called it “an insane level of corruption — even for Trump.”
California Governor Gavin Newsom described it as “waste, fraud, and abuse in the flesh.”
Senator Ron Wyden went even further, branding the arrangement “the most brazen theft and abuse of taxpayer dollars by any president in American history.”
Jamie Raskin called it “pure fraud and highway robbery.”
Nearly 100 House Democrats have already filed an amicus brief seeking to stop the settlement before it takes effect. The deeper legal concern revolves around who controls the money and who benefits from it.
Team Trump agreed to give Team Trump $1.776 billion to be distributed by Team Trump to groups politically aligned with Team Trump while Team Trump oversees the entire process itself.
Even for modern Washington politics, that arrangement sounds absurd.
Potential recipients reportedly include roughly 1,600 people charged over the January 6 Capitol attack, right wing think tanks and Trump’s own super PAC. Trump only dropped the original $10 billion IRS lawsuit after a judge openly questioned whether it was legally valid in the first place.
Trump, asked about it at a White House healthcare event, insisted the arrangement had been “very well received.” He denied any personal role in setting it up.
Featured image via X screengrab
