Republican holdouts in the Senate announced Monday morning a deal with the Trump administration to advance attorney general nominee Todd Blanche.
Senators John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina had sought concessions from the administration related to its so-called anti-weaponization fund and settlement agreement that limited IRS audits of Donald Trump and his family members. The administration addressed both of those concerns, and the two senators will both vote for Blanche, according to a joint statement.
“We are pleased that the Department of Justice has issued a formal order terminating the anti-weaponization fund,” the statement read. “Additionally, the Department has acknowledged in a binding written order that the audit settlement is limited to the plaintiffs and the scope does not extend beyond the defendants in the lawsuit, the IRS and the Treasury, addressing concerns that multiple of our Republican colleagues share.”
The deal creates a path for Blanche to clear the Senate Judiciary Committee, where a “no” vote from either Tillis or Cornyn would have stalled him, ahead of a meeting scheduled for Tuesday morning. It also represents a win for two senators who find themselves able to impact administration policy thanks to the independence they gained after being driven out of politics by Trump.
Monday’s agreement follows days of negotiations in which Trump threatened both to pull Blanche until next year when the two holdouts were out of office and to push for legislation codifying the anti-weaponization fund.
In the end, it was the White House that blinked. In a Sunday night social media post, Blanche said he and his team “enjoyed good faith discussions” with senators throughout his nomination process. “The Department always welcomes and appreciates productive engagement with all members of Congress,” he wrote.
But while Trump neither ended up pulling Blanche nor attempting to pass a law to revive the anti-weaponization fund, it was unclear exactly how much Cornyn and Tillis extracted from the administration.
The settlement agreement that would shield Trump and others from IRS inquiries is itself not changed — Blanche only gave a statement as to what was his interpretation of the settlement’s terms. Cornyn, nevertheless, defended that part of the deal he and Tillis had struck.
“What we could do, and what we did do, is get Todd Blanche to testify under oath, and then to get the DOJ on the record, that this is their official interpretation of those provisions,” he told reporters Monday evening.
As for the anti-weaponization fund, Tillis acknowledged that Trump could bring the fund back in the future.
“Could they create a new one? Sure, because the law allows it,” he told reporters. “Is there something else I’d like to get done before I get out of here? Yeah, making sure that that can’t happen in the future.”
Tillis acknowledged, though, that there might not be the votes to stop Trump from reviving the fund. Plus, there are voices in the Senate and elsewhere calling for Trump to bring it back.
“He’ll bring it back,” Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama told National Review. “He’ll get Blanche in, and then — probably after this Congress, anyway — they’ll do it. Get the ones out that don’t want to vote for it.”