"I'm supposed to work out a settlement with myself," President Donald Trump told reporters a few days after he sued the IRS. He wasn't kidding: His January 29 lawsuit, which alleged damages from an IRS contractor's illegal leaking of his tax returns, pitted Trump against an agency he oversees, represented by Justice Department lawyers who also answer to him.
The "settlement" that the president reached with himself, which Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche announced on May 18, included $1.8 billion in taxpayer money for purported victims of the Biden administration's "lawfare and weaponization." It also included protection from liability for tax violations and any other federal offenses that Trump or his family might have committed. That sweet deal was business as usual at the Justice Department, Trump's personal lawyers improbably claim in a brief they filed on Monday in the Southern District of Florida.
