Todd Blanche was already facing a difficult path toward becoming the nation’s permanent attorney general. Then a startling question began echoing through Washington: Why did the Justice Department apparently fail to defend the United States against a $10 billion lawsuit filed by President Donald Trump?
That question—and the extraordinary agreements that followed—has thrown Blanche’s confirmation into uncertainty while raising new suspicions about whether Trump’s former personal lawyer used the power of the Justice Department to benefit the president.
Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe sounded the alarm during a live CNN interview Tuesday, calling the department’s conduct highly unusual and describing the outcome as an unprecedented “giveaway” to Trump.
“Let’s remember, there essentially was never really a true lawsuit here,” McCabe told anchor Kasie Hunt. “The president sued the IRS for $10 billion. The Department of Justice never even answered the complaint.”
That omission sits at the center of the controversy.
Ordinarily, the Justice Department represents the federal government when it is sued. Government attorneys answer allegations, defend federal agencies and challenge demands they believe are unsupported. In Trump’s case, however, McCabe said the department never established the ordinary legal conflict between two opposing parties.
“So, there were never two opposing parties,” he said. “The Justice Department never stood up and defended the United States in the way that it did in every other suit brought by the same leak from the same person.”
The lawsuit reportedly involved the disclosure of Trump’s tax information. But instead of fully litigating the dispute, the government entered agreements before the case could be dismissed for lacking a genuine controversy, according to McCabe’s account.
One agreement reportedly helped establish a $1.7 billion “anti-weaponization” fund intended to compensate people who claim they were improperly targeted by the Biden administration’s Justice Department. The second allegedly granted sweeping, permanent immunity to Trump, members of his family and his businesses.
The exact legal scope and durability of that reported immunity may ultimately be tested. But the mere appearance that Trump’s Justice Department gave extraordinary protections to Trump has sent red flags flying across Capitol Hill.
“That’s a very suspicious decision on the part of people like Todd Blanche and others,” McCabe said.
Blanche’s connection to Trump makes the controversy particularly combustible. Before joining the administration, he served as Trump’s personal defense attorney. As acting attorney general, he is now responsible for leading a department expected to represent the interests of the United States—not the personal interests of the president.
That line, critics fear, may have been dangerously blurred.
“It was basically a giveaway from the Department of Justice to the president,” McCabe said. “How this thing stands or was ever conceived—I have no idea.”
McCabe emphasized that he had encountered numerous settlements during his career, including matters involving the IRS. None, he argued, contained language resembling the protections reportedly offered in this case.
“I’ve been around many, many settlements of criminal matters, some of which involved IRS criminal matters, and have never seen any language like this,” he said. “I think it’s absolutely unprecedented and an incredibly bad idea.”
Those concerns are no longer confined to Trump’s political opponents.
The settlement has become a major obstacle among Republican senators whose votes Blanche needs. Sen. John Cornyn of Texas said Tuesday that no agreement had been reached to advance the nomination, pointing specifically to both the IRS settlement and the anti-weaponization fund.
Cornyn’s opposition carries additional danger for the White House. After losing his Republican primary to a Trump-backed opponent, the outgoing senator no longer faces the political threat of being challenged by the president’s movement. That freedom has allowed him to pressure the administration by threatening to block nominees and other priorities.
Now Blanche may be caught in the middle of that rebellion.
The confirmation fight also arrives as questions intensify about the anti-weaponization fund itself. Supporters frame the program as a way to compensate people unfairly targeted by past government misconduct. Critics fear it could become a taxpayer-financed reward system for Trump allies who claim political persecution.
The financial stakes are enormous. So are the constitutional ones.
The attorney general commands the Justice Department, oversees federal prosecutions and is expected to exercise independent judgment even when that judgment displeases the president. Senators must now decide whether Blanche’s handling of the Trump lawsuit demonstrates loyalty to the law—or loyalty to his former client.
The White House may attempt to reassure skeptical Republicans before Thursday’s anticipated vote. It could renegotiate parts of the settlement, limit the fund or offer congressional oversight. But every concession would carry an implicit admission that the original arrangement was politically toxic.
What appeared to be a smooth pathway to confirmation has therefore become a potential reckoning.
Blanche’s fate could turn on a lawsuit the Justice Department allegedly never bothered to fight—and an agreement critics say should never have existed.
The most damaging question may also be the simplest: When Donald Trump sued the United States, who inside his Justice Department was actually defending the American public?
