A federal judge held Monday that President Donald Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS was manufactured simply to justify its settlement, including a multibillion-dollar “anti-weaponization” fund for political allies and a shield from IRS scrutiny.
“This lawsuit was not brought to vindicate rights; it was brought to manipulate the judicial process,” US District Judge Kathleen Williams wrote in a blistering 56-page ruling, POLITICO reported. POLITICO, like Business Insider, is a part of the Axel Springer Global Reporters Network.
“This was an attempt to use the Court to provide some legitimacy to an agreement to confer immunity to people and entities affiliated with the President and to earmark billions of dollars from American taxpayers to redress grievances not defined in the law,” the ruling said.
The fact that the federal government never countered arguments that the arrangement was unconstitutional —and that acting Attorney General Todd Blanche unilaterally canceled plans for the Anti-Weaponization Fund — was a glaring signal that the lawsuit was not genuine, Williams said.
Williams suggested that Blanche and Associate Attorney General Stan Woodward may be subject to investigative or disciplinary action by state bar associations.
She also sanctioned two of Trump’s personal attorneys who signed the initial complaint against the Internal Revenue Service, referring Alejandro Brito to the Florida bar for potential discipline and banning Daniel Epstein from practicing in the Southern District of Florida for at least a year. The plaintiffs, including Trump, and certain agencies are also barred from citing the agreement in official proceedings as evidence of a formal settlement.
Though the administration has argued that Trump had filed the lawsuit — a demand for a $10 billion payout for the leak of his tax returns — in his personal capacity, Williams said that explanation was untenable.
“The court declines to adopt or accept the credulous exercise of divorcing President Trump’s current job title from an understanding of what happened here,” she wrote. “The Lead Plaintiff and the Government are one, a fully realized unitary interest.”
Williams added that Trump could have brought the lawsuit while he was a private citizen, but appears to have waited until he was reelected president and appointed his former lawyer to help lead the DOJ.
The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The White House referred questions to Trump’s personal lawyers.
“The IRS wrongly allowed a rogue, politically motivated employee to leak private and confidential information about President Trump, his family, and the Trump Organization to the New York Times, ProPublica, and other left-wing news outlets, which was then illegally released to millions of people,” a spokesperson for Trump’s legal team said. “President Trump continues to hold those who wrong America and Americans accountable.”
The ruling is a full-throated repudiation of Trump and his administration at a delicate moment for Blanche, who faces a Senate confirmation hearing Wednesday at which the Anti-Weaponization Fund could play a prominent role.
Williams said she was “extremely troubled” by Blanche’s testimony to Congress about the settlement in May, saying his suggestion that the court could not review the settlement agreement was “at best, misleading and, at worst, disingenuous.”
The Obama-appointed judge took particular umbrage at the Justice Department’s decision to remain “conspicuously absent” from the Trump-IRS litigation, even when serious questions were raised about its legitimacy.
“Under these circumstances, the Court may reasonably infer that the Government failed to defend this lawsuit … because its position would not withstand judicial scrutiny and because resolution of the threshold issues identified by the Court would not have favored its preferred outcome to this case,” Williams said.
This story originally appeared on POLITICO and is courtesy of the Axel Springer Global Reporters Network, which harnesses the resources of the company’s newsrooms to publish ambitious scoops, investigations, interviews, opinion pieces, and analysis. It allows journalists — including those from POLITICO, Business Insider, WELT, BILD, Onet, and Fakt — to collaborate on major stories for an international audience of hundreds of millions across platforms.
