The rebellion against Todd Blanche’s nomination to be attorney general, now seemingly contained, at no point fundamentally questioned President Trump’s new protections from the I.R.S.

New York Times

Mr. Blanche did, after weeks of back and forth, put in writing that he was ending the $1.8 billion fund created to pay people who say they have been targeted by Democratic officials. And as part of the same announcement Sunday night, Mr. Blanche clarified that there were, actually, some limits on the seemingly boundless protection from I.R.S. examination that he ordered up for Mr. Trump, his family and their businesses.

But the fact remains that Mr. Trump, a billionaire who has tangled with the I.R.S. throughout his life, no longer has to worry about the agency coming after him for any of the many aggressive tax positions he has taken over the years. Where the I.R.S. previously made a point of regularly auditing whoever occupies the Oval Office, Mr. Trump has leveraged his control of the federal government to instead escape the scrutiny that every other modern president, not to mention every other regular taxpayer, has been subject to.___________

The problem with Blanche rescinding the “anti-weaponization” fund order is that it wouldn’t seem to necessarily fully kill off the fund.

As the National Review’s Andrew McCarthy has explained, the settlement’s terms (see our annotation here) state that it could be “modified only with the written agreement of the parties.” That would include Trump.

So while Blanche has rescinded a separate order he wrote that actually created the fund under the terms of the settlement, the settlement itself still exists — and could seemingly be enforced.

In fact, Cornyn and Blanche basically explained all of this during an exchange at Blanche’s confirmation hearing in mid-July, before they agreed to greenlight his nomination.

When he started pressing Blanche, Cornyn asked whether the settlement agreement had been modified by the parties, including Trump. (It hadn’t, Blanche said.) Under Cornyn’s questioning, Blanche admitted that even if he verbally promised to fully kill off the fund, the settlement remained an “enforceable document,” and Trump could file a lawsuit seeking to enforce its terms.

“There’s no guarantee that he or one of the other plaintiffs might [not] raise that issue by way of a lawsuit and — a breach of contract lawsuit in the future,” Cornyn said.

Blanche claimed that, because the fund would have been ended, “the results of such litigation, whatever it would be, wouldn’t be a revival of the fund.” And Cornyn dropped the issue.

But McCarthy wrote that that’s not the full story.

“Absent such a modification agreement, however, the Anti-Weaponization Fund is still viable and could be revived at any time, despite Blanche’s insistence to the contrary,” McCarthy said.

And even some supporters of the anti-weaponization fund suggested Blanche’s document could just be rendered moot.

“Can be undone after Tuesday,” Republican lawyer Mike Howell, who applied to serve on the “anti-weaponization” fund’s board, wrote on X late Sunday. “The Anti-Weaponization Fund is great.”

Blanche and his allies could argue that the new document would make it politically impossible to revive the fund — because it would look so bad and could draw lawmakers to pass legislation killing it off. But there are no guarantees.

Legal experts have been broadly skeptical of Blanche's order since it was released, with Carissa Byrne Hessick, criminal law professor at the University of North Carolina, writing Monday, "I see nothing in Blanche's letter that would revent him from reviving the fund the moment that he is confirmed." Former U.S. Attorney Barb McQuade similarly called the order "hollow," noting that even if the fund isn't revived, the Trump administration can still make payouts to allies like Jan. 6 rioters through individual settlements.