The Hidden Story Behind Todd Blanche's DOJ Confirmation

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This is The Smerconish Podcast. For Independent Minds.

**Michael Smerconish** (0:31)
We had a huge vote in the Saturday poll. We actually had three Fauci related poll questions in the last couple of days. Each of them garnered a big vote, but none as large as Saturday. Just a tick under 50,000 votes cast on a question that asked whether Dr. Fauci should be brought back to the Senate, this time with a grant of immunity, to answer questions about the pandemic. And roughly 85% agreed with that proposal, which I made in my CNN commentary on Saturday. Yes, give him immunity and bring him back. And in setting up the question, I said that I understood Rand Paul's desire to get answers to questions about COVID's origin and whether gain of function research had played any role. By the way, in Andy Jacobson's book, you'll hear about this in the third hour, she talks about gain of function in her lab leak scenario for biological warfare. And she makes reference to COVID. I suspect she thinks that that was nothing but a Chinese cover story. But what I argued on Saturday was, look, a million Americans died. And we're still waiting for a conversation in public where Dr. Fauci gets questioned. I want to see that. But, but I also explained in great detail why I think that Dr. Fauci is well grounded to be worried about opening himself up to legal peril, however invalid, if he were to testify. And I backed it up with a long list of how lawfare has been used against Trump opponents since his re-election. Actually, I managed again to offend everybody because I began by saying, and you've heard this from me countless times here on POTUS, that I think lawfare was used against Trump. Those four indictments represented in varying degrees a form of lawfare against Donald Trump. And Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan DA, his hush money conviction, in my opinion did more to put Donald Trump back in the White House than any rally ever did, which might explain, and I said this as well, why among all of Trump's legal nemeses, Bragg alone is the only one who has escaped scrutiny. Since retaking office, think about it this way, Trump has used, or Trump's DOJ has used, the law as a sword. And as a shield as well, which I'll talk about with regard to what transpired last night with Todd Blanche.
Actually, I'll do that now. Blanche blinked is the bottom line. The acting Attorney General, who never forget was the president's personal criminal defense lawyer, he posted two documents on social media. And the first of them was a signed memo, formally rescinding this $1.8 billion anti-weaponization fund. Remember what it was. It was treasury money generated by settling Trump's own lawsuit against the IRS over the leak of his tax returns.
That was a suit in which he initially demanded $10 billion, and which his own Justice Department never contested, even though lawyers at the IRS believe the government had a clear defense. A guy went away for this. I mean, it really happened, and Trump was done wrong.
But of course, as part of his settlement, he sets up this compensation fund for people that he says were the victims of quote-unquote weaponization.
And Senate Republicans just, you know, stood still, recognizing that it could include people charged in connection with January 6 Tom Tillis said that it was a payout pot for punks. That's what he said over the weekend. So that was one of the documents. The second document with regard to Blanche narrowed the other half of the settlement. Because remember, the settlement was, we're setting up, I guess it was literally, you know, $1.776 billion. But the second part of it was the immunity agreement.
A sweeping immunity from IRS scrutiny that was given to Trump, it was given to his family, and it was given to their businesses.
Now, the important part is what survived because that's the heart of the matter. The pool of beneficiaries shrunk. It's now Trump, two of his sons and the Trump Organization. And yes, future returns can be audited again, but the core remains intact. The IRS is ordered to abandon any audit of the president's past returns.
The Times calls this today unprecedented and potentially illegal, an illegal benefit to a sitting president worth who knows how much, right? It's all dependent upon what kind of tax liability he would have had in those returns. So let me say it more clearly. The president is retaining retroactive immunity from his own tax collector. And then there's this aspect of the story that I think is very insightful. Blanche posted last night two different documents, and only one of them carries his signature. The signed one is the one that kills the fund. That's the concession that the Senators Cornyn and Tillis demanded. So he signs that part, which kills the fund. The unsigned one is the document that matters to the Trump family. That's the one saying that the president, two of his sons, and the Trump organization keep their immunity from audits of past returns. Nobody put their name on that one. Nobody put a signature on that one. So the part that costs Trump something, that's official. The part that benefits Trump rests on a statement that nobody signed, which Cornyn's office is saying is nevertheless binding. Are your eyes glazing over? Yes. Let me try it this way. From The Times, because I want to make a point about this. They report it this way. Todd Blanche, the acting Attorney General, confirmed in writing on Sunday night that the Justice Department would abandon elements of the deal it struck with President Trump to resolve his lawsuit against the IRS, conceding to demands from Republican Senators who had threatened to block the nomination as Attorney General. And then it talks about a little bit of the background. Cornyn of Texas, Tillis of North Carolina, both of them, by the way, on their way out. They talk about Blanche posting the two documents on social media last night, the signed memo, which he said the Justice Department was formally rescinding the order that created the Anti-Weaponization Fund and the unsigned part, which clarified the terms of the IRS protections. And then it says this, Blanche posted the documents after days of negotiations over his confirmation, though the senators had been negotiating with Mr. Blanche in a bid to end the impasse, Trump in recent days had complicated their efforts by pushing publicly for the restoration of the fund. So that's been going on in sort of the backdrop while there have been negotiations with Blanche, Trump has been in social media saying his usual things. Todd Blanche was a voice of reason. It will immediately be back on the table. I will get it done, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.