Sen. Susan Collins GRILLS Blanche Over Anti-Weaponization Fund And Domestic Violence Cuts!

本站添加: 2026-06-02

[00:00:00]First, has the DOJ ever used amounts in the judgment fund to pay claims that have yet to be brought against the United States government based on the settlement of a completely unrelated case?

[00:00:18]>> Thank you, Senator. So, the short answer is yes. I mean, we have done this in the past. This was done during the Obama administration, something almost identical in structure to what we announced yesterday. And >> That answer, yes, the Obama administration did something almost identical, is Blanche's entire legal defense of the $1.8 billion fund. And Senator Susan Collins, a Republican, a senior appropriator, a lead sponsor of the Violence Against Women Act, is one of the most precise questioners in the United States Senate. She did not come to this hearing to score points. She came to understand what the legal mechanism actually is, whether it has been used before, what the oversight structure looks like, and whether a 25% cut to domestic violence programs is really what the administration wants to stand behind. She asked four distinct questions. Each one was more specific than the last. And Blanche's answers, honest in ways that were not always helpful to his position, reveal the contours of a legal mechanism that is genuinely unusual, even if not entirely unprecedented. Watch how she built the case.

[00:01:22]>> Mr. Attorney General, yesterday the Justice Department announced the creation of a nearly like $1.8 billion anti-weaponization fund to compensate individuals who were purportedly targeted by the Biden administration, in exchange for which President Trump dropped his $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS for the completely inappropriately of the president and his organizations tax data. Amounts for this new fund will come from the judgment fund, a permanent law appropriation for playing paying claims and settlements brought against the United States government. Amounts in the judgment fund have traditionally been used for the payment of specific claims against the government or amounts owned for the settlement of those claims, but not for future claims that have yet to be bought. So, I have some questions for you. First, has the DOJ ever used amounts in the judgment fund to pay claims that have yet to be brought against the United States government based on the settlement of a completely unrelated case?

[00:02:56]>> Thank you, Senator. So, the short answer is yes. I mean, we have done this in the past. This was done during the Obama administration, something almost identical in structure to what we announced yesterday. In that case, there were allegations made by Native Americans that the Department of Agriculture had systematically um treated them unfairly and some had filed claims. There was a pending lawsuit, but many had not. The a fund very similar um to the one that was established yesterday was set up. Um it had it was funded by in today's dollars a little over a billion dollars.

[00:03:33]Um And and and a single claims commissioner was appointed to review the claims and to uh distribute funds. In that case, um at the end, there was around 300 million left over. And the Obama administration um had set it up so that that money from the judgment fund was distributed to nonprofits and other NGO.

[00:03:56]>> Did you hear the Obama administration comparison? Blanche's legal defense of the $1.8 billion fund is that the Obama administration did something structurally similar. Native American farmers. A settlement with the Department of Agriculture. A fund set up for claimants who had not yet filed. A single commissioner. Money from the judgment fund. That is not nothing. If the Obama administration used this mechanism and it was not challenged as unconstitutional, then the claim that this fund is entirely unprecedented is more complicated. But Collins was asking a more precise question. And Blanche's answer, honest as it was, contained admissions that Collins was about to use. He said, "It is unusual." That is true. He said, "It is not unprecedented." He said the Obama fund had a single commissioner. This fund will have five. He said the Obama fund left $300 million that went to nonprofits. This fund will return leftover money to the federal government. Those differences are real.

[00:04:55]But Collins' underlying questions about the oversight structure, about who reviews the claims, about whether the information will be public, are the ones that determine whether this fund has accountability or not. And Blanche's answer to who appoints the commissioners contained a correction that became the most revealing moment of the exchange.

[00:05:13]>> Will the information related to the claims be publicly reported?

[00:05:19]>> So, that's a good question. I mean, look, there's privacy laws that exist.

[00:05:22]So, I I I I don't want to sit here today and say every scintilla of data collected will be released, but of course. I mean, of course there's there's the there's accountability that that the commission has, a quarterly report that has to come to the Attorney General, which will will certainly be public. There's a process that that you all will get information and there's a FOIA process. So, I very much anticipate that the claims that are awarded the [snorts] basis and the amount will for sure be be made public along the way.

[00:05:54]>> Let me just switch to a different issue which Chairman Moran brought up. Along with Chairman Moran and other members of this committee, I was one of the lead sponsors of the Violence Against Women Act Reauthorization of 2022.

[00:06:13]These programs are critical to reducing violence against women, ensuring that justice is served, and strengthening services to victims and survivors of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking. In Maine, the rural victims program is especially critical. Despite the importance and effectiveness of these programs, the Department's budget request proposes reducing funding from by about 25%.

[00:06:51]Why is the Department proposing a reduction in funding to combat domestic violence and to support survivors?

[00:07:02]>> Well, first of all, I completely agree with you that these are extraordinarily important programs and the funds are are well used um to to support these programs. We have asked for $539 million, I believe, in in in money to support all these programs and and that I mean, look, there's a lot of money that goes 190 million for grants to combat, you know, to stop the the stop grants, which is extraordinarily important. And so, it is a priority. Um obviously, there's we have to make choices in the President's budget has to make choices on where to spend that money, but it is extraordinarily important and and the $539 million dollars we've asked for will go to support all these programs. I mean, so yes, there's we are asking less for less money than than the budget had last year, but it's not because we don't view it as as extraordinarily important.

[00:07:53]>> Well, I would suggest that cutting the budget for these important programs by 25% is a huge cut. And >> Collins started with the legal mechanism, and she identified the precise issue before Blanche had a chance to frame it. The Judgment Fund is a permanent indefinite appropriation. It exists to pay claims and settlements against the United States government.

[00:08:18]When a court awards damages against the government, or when the government settles a lawsuit, the Judgment Fund is the mechanism through which those payments are made. Congress does not need to appropriate specific money for each settlement. The Judgment Fund is always available for that purpose. Its traditional use is specific and reactive. A claim is brought. The claim is resolved through court judgment or settlement. The Judgment Fund pays the resolved amount. That is the mechanism as it was designed. Collins identified the departure from that traditional use.

[00:08:49]She asked, has the DOJ ever used the Judgment Fund to pay claims that have not yet been brought based on the settlement of a completely unrelated case? This is the precise legal question. The $1.8 billion fund is not paying specific resolved claims against the government. It is creating a pool of money for future claims from people who have not yet filed, who are not parties to any existing litigation. Funded through what is characterized as a settlement between the IRS and the DOJ.

[00:09:17]Collins was asking whether this is a legitimate use of the Judgment Fund or a creative interpretation designed to move money without congressional appropriation. Blanche's answer, the Obama administration did something almost identical, is legally significant. If there is a precedent, the question of unprecedented use is more complicated. But precedent does not determine legality. The Obama era use was not challenged and resolved in a court that blessed the mechanism. It simply was not challenged successfully, which means the question of whether this use of the judgment fund is legally authorized remains open, regardless of what the Obama administration did.

[00:09:53]Blanche made an error in this hearing that Collins caught and corrected, and it is worth examining what the error reveals. Collins asked, "Aren't those commissioners appointed by the president?" Blanche said, "No. Four of them are appointed by the Attorney General and one is appointed by the Attorney General in consultation with leadership of this body, meaning Congress." Collins accepted that correction. But look at what it means.

[00:10:17]In other hearings, in Van Hollen's exchange and coverage of this fund, the impression had been created that the commissioners were presidential appointees. Blanche here clarified that they are his appointees, all five, four directly, one in consultation with congressional leadership. This is actually a more concentrated form of control than presidential appointment in some respects. Presidential appointees go through Senate confirmation. They have a process. They can be questioned.

[00:10:44]Their qualifications are public.

[00:10:46]Blanche's appointees, the five commissioners who will determine who receives money from this fund and how much, do not go through Senate confirmation. They are selected by Blanche, period, with one selected in consultation with congressional leadership, a process that is not defined, not binding, and not the same as confirmation. This means the $1.8 billion fund, created without congressional authorization, funded through a self-settlement mechanism, paying claims not yet brought, will be administered by five people selected by the official who created the fund, without any independent confirmation or external check on their selection.

[00:11:23]Collins noted this. She did not press it to a confrontation, but it is in the record, and it is one of the most significant and features of the fund's accountability design. Collins then asked about transparency. Will the information about claims, who applied, what they claimed, what was awarded, be publicly reported? Blanche's answer was careful. He said there are privacy laws that apply. He cannot commit to every scintilla of data being released. But he expressed expectation that awarded claims, the basis and the amount, will be made public. He referenced a quarterly report to the Attorney General that will be public. He mentioned FOIA.

[00:12:00]He said he very much anticipates that information about awarded claims will be available. Let's examine the standard Blanche set against the standard the fund should meet. He anticipates that awarded information will be public. He expects the quarterly report will be public. He thinks the FOIA process will provide access. Anticipates, expects, thinks. These are not commitments. They are predictions about a fund that is already operational, whose structure has already been established. If the transparency of this fund is going to be adequate, if the American people are going to know who is receiving 1.8 billion dollars of their money and why, that transparency should be written into the fund structure as a requirement. Not expressed as an anticipation by the official who created it. Collins accepted this answer without pushing it to a firm commitment. But she was building the record. The transparency mechanism she was told about, quarterly reports, FOIA, anticipated public disclosure of awarded claims, is now on the record. And if that transparency does not materialize, the hearing provides the baseline against which the failure can be measured. Blanche's reliance on the Obama-era Keep Eagle style fund as precedent deserves more examination than it received in the hearing. He described a fund created to settle claims from Native American farmers against the USDA. A fund structured similarly, drawing from judgment fund money, paying claimants who had not filed individual lawsuits, administered by a commissioner. He said it is almost identical in structure. If that is accurate, and the description is consistent with what is publicly known about those settlement programs, then Blanche is correct that this mechanism has been used before. The Keepseagle settlement and related programs did create funds for claimants who had not individually sued. But there are important differences that Blanche acknowledged and that the comparison partially obscures. The Keepseagle settlement involved a specific defined class of potential claimants. Native American farmers who had experienced USDA discrimination in loan programs.

[00:13:59]The class was defined. The harm was defined. The eligibility criteria were derived from the nature of the underlying claim. The anti-weaponization fund has no defined class. Anyone who believes they were victimized by the government's weaponization of law enforcement can apply. That is an extraordinarily broad and subjectively defined category. The Keepseagle comparison involves a defined harm with a defined class. The anti-weaponization fund involves a political characterization of harm, weaponization, with no objective criteria for determining whether the characterization applies to any specific case. Second, the Keepseagle settlement involved an adversarial process. There were actual plaintiffs with actual claims who negotiated with the government through actual lawyers in an actual legal proceeding. The fund extended beyond the named plaintiffs, but it arose from a real legal contest. The anti-weaponization fund arises from a settlement between the IRS and the DOJ, two agencies controlled by the same executive. There was no adversarial process. There were no opposing parties.

[00:15:02]There was, as Congressman Lieu described, essentially one entity negotiating with itself. Those are not small differences. They are the differences between a legal mechanism responding to an actual dispute and a legal mechanism designed to generate money for a predetermined political purpose. Collins' pivot to the Violence Against Women Act was deliberate and significant. She is a lead sponsor of the 2022 reauthorization. She has a direct, personal legislative investment in these programs. And she was not going to let the hearing end without putting the 25% budget cut on the record. She named the programs. VAWA grants, the STOP grants, grants to stop sexual violence, rural victims programs, which she specifically noted are critical in Maine, where geographic isolation makes access to services particularly difficult. She said, "The department's budget request proposes reducing funding by about 25%."

[00:15:56]Blanche's defense was familiar. "539 million dollars is still substantial.

[00:16:02]The programs are extraordinarily important. The administration had to make choices. The money is well used and will continue to be." Collins' response was direct. She said, "Cutting the budget for these important programs by 25% is a huge cut. And I hope that's something the subcommittee will take a close look at." That closing statement is a signal to her colleagues on the appropriations subcommittee. Collins is telling them, on the record in a hearing, that she believes this cut is wrong. That she expects the subcommittee to push back. That the administration's stated respect for these programs is not reflected in the budget math. Blanche's answer, "We asked for less money, but not because we don't view it as extraordinarily important," contains a logical difficulty that Collins was pointing to. You cannot simultaneously declare a program extraordinarily important and propose cutting its budget by 25%.

[00:16:54]The budget is the statement of priority in concrete terms. Verbal declarations of importance do not write checks to domestic violence shelters in rural Maine. Collins knows this. She has spent her career navigating the gap between what officials say about programs and what the budget does to them. And her closing statement, "I hope the subcommittee will take a close look," is the mechanism through through she will try to close that gap. Collins' exchange was fundamentally different in character from the confrontational hearings that have defined this series. She was not trying to expose bad faith. She was not building a case for disbarment or predicting the loss of a law license.

[00:17:29]She was doing something more patient and more consequential. She was building a documented legal and structural record of the $1.8 billion fund, its mechanism, its precedents, its oversight structure, its transparency commitments, its commissioner appointment process that will serve as the baseline for future accountability. When Blanche says the fund will be transparent, that quarterly reports will be public, that awarded claims will be disclosed, Collins' hearing is the document against which those commitments will be measured. When the fund's commissioners are appointed, all five of them by Blanche, the record of that appointment authority is in Collins' hearing transcript. When the Obama precedent is invoked again to defend the fund, the full comparison, including the differences Blanche acknowledged and the differences he did not, is in Collins' record. And when the Appropriations Subcommittee takes up the Violence Against Women Act funding, the hearing where a Republican senator called a 25% cut a huge cut, and the acting attorney general defended it as not reflecting a lack of importance, that record is also available. Collins does not shout. She does not threaten.

[00:18:34]She does not predict disbarment. She asks questions. She builds records. She says, "I hope the subcommittee will take a close look." And in the United States Senate, on the Appropriations Committee, that is how policy actually changes, not in a moment, in a record. Collins built the record. It is there for anyone who wants to use it.