Trump’s proposed Anti-Weaponization Fund of $1.776 billion is shaking up a lot of folks.
Reports of corruption that would have been denied or minimized are now dramatically public, including:
1. Insider Trading: Trump made money from stocks whose prices were affected by his influence.
2. Immunity: The Internal Revenue Service won’t scrutinize any past or present alleged tax irregularities by the president and his family.
3. Bribery: The Food and Drug Administration allow flavored e-cigarettes after a $5 million PAC tobacco company donation. What accounts for this visibility? It’s that Anti-Weaponization Fund using our tax dollars.
(READ MORE: Deborah Levine: Instruct and inspire with faith in these treacherous times)
I take it personally that neo-fascist militias like the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers would receive money after attacking the Capitol and law enforcement and threatening elected officials. I worked in Tulsa shortly after the Oklahoma City bombing and was trained by the FBI to deal with neo-fascist white supremacist groups. The Proud Boys and Oath Keepers are the latest generation of these hate groups. I will never agree with what our government is doing and proposes to do.
Trump continually refers to Jan. 6 as a “day of love” and calls the rioters “patriots.” His pardoning of those charged and convicted in connection with the Jan. 6 attack was bad enough. But his proposal to use our tax dollars to compensate rioters, including those convicted of assaulting police, is opening the equivalent of a civil war.
Sen. Ted Cruz said on his podcast that GOP senators were screaming angry about the fund to the attorney general. The funding bill for ICE was pushed aside in “one of the roughest meetings I’ve seen in my entire time in the Senate,” Cruz said.
According to the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Jamie Raskin, “It’s illegal, unconstitutional, and outrageous. Congress controls spending of money from the federal government, and we never voted to establish a $1.8 billion fund to pay off insurrectionists and his extremist private militias, and we’d never spend money on that.”
The attempts to again rewrite the Jan. 6 history are monumental. The Justice Department has removed hundreds of press releases detailing the charges against hundreds who participated in the riot from its website.
Objections to the removal prompted a reply from the DOJ Rapid Response account on X. The post noted: “We are proud to reverse the DOJ’s weaponization under the Biden administration … We will do everything in our power to make whole those who were persecuted for political purposes. This includes stripping DOJ’s website of partisan propaganda.”
The depth of corruption needs to be visible to all of us. Note that Stanley Woodward, a Trump nominee for a high-level DOJ legal position, had represented several Jan. 6 defendants whose cases were dismissed and now stand to be beneficiaries of the fund. Trump quickly fired all officials who were part of the Jan. 6 investigation and prosecutions to protect the perps and himself.
If you feel that it’s totally inappropriate for your tax dollars to go to Proud Boys and Oath Keepers, you may be out of luck. The proposed commission that judges funding requests follows the same principles as the current DOJ. There will be five members appointed by the attorney general and one chosen in consultation with congressional leaders. However, Trump can remove members if he dislikes them.
Screaming is a good response to the corrupt Anti-Weaponization Fund.
So is preparing for battle. I certainly am … What about you?
Contact Deborah Levine, an author, trainer/coach and editor of the American Diversity Report, at Deborah@AmericanDiversityReport.com.