Trump just found a loophole to grant contested payouts for MAGA senators: DOJ memo

Ahead of their meeting with Acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche, the Trump White House sent U.S. senators, on Thursday, a one-page U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) memo on the Trump Administration's "weaponization fund." And the memo shows that President Donald Trump has found a loophole to pay out senators from the fund.

Punchbowl News' Andrew Desiderio, posting a copy of the memo on X, reports, "White House just sent this one-pager to Senate GOP offices on the $1.8B 'weaponization' fund ahead of Blanche's meeting with Senate R’s. It says there are 'no partisan restrictions' [and] Dems can apply too [and] that senators 'whose records were secretly subpoenaed' can apply."

The "anti-weaponization fund," the Trump White House claims, is designed to help Americans it says were unfairly targeted by DOJ during Joe Biden's presidency. Trump's critics, however, are attacking it as a "slush fund."

Journalist Ariel Kovler offered a scathing critique of the memo on Bluesky, posting, "Oh, the DoJ letter to Senators about the weaponization fund says Senators can apply too. Senators, I may have stolen $1.7bn from the American taxpayer but if you don't block it, you can have some! A naked attempt at bribery." The memo is divided into different parts, laying out MAGA talking points on the fund.

In 2025, lawmakers debated a provision in a funding bill that allowed senators to sue for $500,000 if federal agents searched their phone records. The provision only applied to GOP lawmakers, much to Democratic lawmakers' umbrage. But the DOJ memo issued on Thursday addresses the partisan concerns.

Trump's "anti-weaponization fund" is generating intense debates on Capitol Hill, with many Democratic lawmakers warning that the money could go to rioters who attacked the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6, 2021.

Members of the Trump Administration and MAGA lawmakers in Congress, however, are arguing that the fund isn't promoting any type of criminality — only offering compensation to Americans it says were wrongly targeted for federal criminal charges by the Biden administration and former U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland.

After the January 6 attack on the Capitol, Garland and his colleagues at DOJ prosecuted a long list of rioters — some of whom were found guilty and sent to federal prison. But Trump, after returning to the White House on January 6, 2021, granted federal pardons to the rioters — including members of far-right groups like the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers. And quite a few January 6 rioters were released from federal prison.

Critics of those pardons are now arguing that the Trump administration's "anti-weaponization fund" goes way beyond the presidential pardons — and that Trump is now offering payouts and reward to people who violently attacked the Capitol in order to prevent Joe Biden from being confirmed as president by Congress. Acting AG Blanche, however, is disputing that characterization of the fund and voiced his views during a recent hearing on Capitol Hill.

Attorney Norm Eisen is a vehement critic of the fund, arguing that Trump and his allies are rewarding an act of insurrection.