Trump threatens to pull Todd Blanche’s AG nomination rather than give in to Republican holdouts over weaponization fund

President Donald Trump on Thursday said he would consider withdrawing Todd Blanche’s nomination to be the next U.S. Attorney General rather than concede to demands from two Republican senators who want him to give up plans to use $1.8 billion in tax dollars to reward criminals who were prosecuted during previous Democratic administrations. In a post on Truth Social, Trump called his ex-criminal defense attorney a “star” who “has the potential to go down as one of the Greatest Attorney Generals of All Time” while grousing that Senators John Cornyn, R-Texas and Thom Tillis, R-N.C., are “refusing to vote” for Blanche’s confirmation. He also vowed to keep Blanche in place as acting attorney general regardless of what the senate does with his nomination.“I have no objection to temporarily withdrawing Todd’s name, if they do not do the right thing, and putting him back after Cornyn and Tillis are out of office,” he said.Both Cornyn and Tillis are in their last year of service in the upper chamber — the Texas senator lost a primary to a Trump-backed challenger, while Tillis elected to retire rather than face a MAGA insurgent over his past criticism of the president. The two outgoing Republicans have for days been pushing Blanche and the White House to provide assurances that Trump’s plan for a $1.776 billion “anti-weaponization fund” are permanently binned before they will give their assent to his bid to replace former attorney general Pam Bondi on a permanent basis. Trump says his former defense attorney will remain in place as acting attorney general (AP)Both are members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which had been set to vote to advance the nomination at a meeting on Thursday before it became clear that the panel would not be able to do so without support from both.A committee spokesperson said on Wednesday that the hearing had been “postponed as work continues to secure sufficient support in committee to favorably report Attorney General-nominee Todd Blanche, who is highly qualified for the job.”While the White House and Blanche have both stated that the fund is “dead,” Cornyn and Tillis have both asked for assurances in writing out of concern that the text of a settlement with the president’s legal team still could require it to be set up — as well as fears that Blanche and the White House cannot be trusted on this matter.They also oppose a provision giving Trump perpetual immunity from IRS audits of his finances prior to May 19, 2026.Cornyn told MS NOW on Thursday he was “prepared to vote no” on the president’s pick.“But I do think I owe it to my constituents and to Mr. Blanche to try to negotiate in good faith, and that's what we've been doing,” he said. Cornyn added that Trump “could fix this in a minute” by providing the written assurances he and Tillis have demanded. The so-called “weaponization fund” at issue was birthed from a settlement between Trump’s legal team and the IRS the Department of Justice engineered after Trump took office in 2025. In a press release, the DoJ claimed that the fund would be used to “provide a systematic process to hear and redress claims of others who suffered weaponization and lawfare” allegedly committed by the agency.The plan was met with immediate revulsion in Congress, with moderate Republicans in both chambers joining with Democrats to condemn it and describe it as a “slush fund” designed to reward Trump’s allies with lucrative payouts. Controversy immediately erupted over whether the funds could be used to reward January 6 rioters who were successfully prosecuted by the Biden Justice Department, then pardoned by Trump after he took office.Funding for it was left out of the Republicans’ second reconciliation package last month, but Cornyn and his holdout colleagues have gone further by demanding it be written out of existence altogether.In his Truth Social post, Trump claimed credit for ending both Cornyn’s and Tillis’ political careers, implying that both were opposing Blanche out of pique. But the Texas senator noted he’s voted with Trump “99.3 percent of the time” and said the president’s decision to endorse his primary opponent “has nothing to do” with his opposition to Blanche absent a resolution on the “weaponization fund.”“This is about making sure that even if you're the president of the United States, you don't get favorable terms from the government in a settlement of a lawsuit that ordinary citizens would not get, like protections from audits by the IRS for the foreseeable future,” he said.John Bowden contributed reporting from Washington