Conservative alarmed Trump may have opened the door to slave 'reparations'

President Donald Trump’s $1.8 billion slush fund for Trump-linked institutions and Trump supporters is, according to one conservative, a gateway to something most right-wingers oppose: Reparations for the descendants of American slaves

“It will set a precedent that a future president could use to bypass Congress and the courts to implement wide-reaching policies without congressional support—including race-based reparations,” wrote The Federalist Society's Darin R. Batram, who practices appellate and constitutional law in Washington, for The Wall Street Journal. Batram then reviewed how the fund was created, observing that Trump sued the IRS even though as president he had two conflicts of interest: First, that he was suing an agency he controlled; and second, that the Justice Department which he likewise controlled is supposed to defend the IRS from his litigation.

Trump sued the IRS by alleging that it owed him $10 billion because a contractor associated with them leaked his tax returns during his first term. Because no victim of IRS leaks has ever received monetary compensation, and due to his conflict of interest, the judge assigned to preside over the case ordered all parties to wait for experts to weigh in on its legality. The judge established May 20 as a deadline, so on May 18 he dropped the lawsuit after having his Justice Department and IRS settle for $1.776 billion. He then said he would use the money to pay Trump supporters, including perhaps Jan. 6th insurrectionists.

“Guardrails against the use of public funds to settle perceived wrongs have been eroded before. Mr. Trump has pointed to a compensation program President Obama established to redress harm to Native American farmers, known as the Keepseagle program, which settled a case brought against the U.S. Department of Agriculture involving farm loans and benefits,” Batram said. “Keepseagle provided that a claimant could receive up to $50,000 on the presentation of basic evidence and $250,000 with supporting evidence that the USDA could dispute. Importantly, this settlement program was established despite fundamental weaknesses in the underlying claims by the farmers, including a decision by the court to deny them class certification.”

“Remedying perceived harm to Mr. Trump’s supporters stemming from the Russia-collusion investigations or the events following Jan. 6 could seamlessly morph into a future president’s deciding to implement an even broader remedial program—providing reparations to black Americans for slavery and ‘systemic racism,’” Batram wrote. “The Trump fund would give legitimacy to administrative compensation for a politically defined class of government victims—even if neither Congress nor any court has authorized such compensation.”

He concluded, “Justice should be administered impartially and shouldn’t be weaponized against political rivals. That happened with Mr. Obama’s Russia-collusion investigation, which continued through Mr. Trump’s first term. It continued through the Biden administration. But the Anti-Weaponization Fund is the wrong remedy, and one that risks making the government even more lawless.”

Unlike the Obama precedent, which went to genuine victims of oppression, Trump seems to have pursued this fund to benefit himself and his political base, according to Jonathan V. Last, a conservative commentator for The Bulwark.

“Trump understood that while it might be illegal to go to CBS and ABC and demand that they pay him protection money, he could use a civil lawsuit as justification for creating a private legal contract that amounted to the same thing,” Last wrote. “He further understood that if he filed a civil suit against the U.S. government and then became president, he could direct the government to settle with him on whatever terms he desired.”