Two police officers who fought off the mob at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, went to federal court on Wednesday. They want a judge to stop anyone, rioters included, from collecting money out of a new $1.776 billion fund the Trump administration set up for people who say they were victims of politically motivated prosecutions.
The plaintiffs are Daniel Hodges, a Metropolitan Police Department officer, and Harry Dunn, a former U.S. Capitol Police officer who is running for Congress in Maryland. Both testified before Congress about what they lived through that day. Video showed a rioter ripping a mask off Hodges while he was pinned against a door in the fight over a tunnel entrance.
Their lawyers filed the suit one day after Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche defended the fund at a congressional hearing. Blanche, who was a personal attorney for President Donald Trump before joining the Justice Department, would not rule out payouts to rioters who assaulted police. He called the fund “unusual” but not unprecedented.
The complaint calls the “Anti-Weaponization Fund” an illegal slush fund. It says Trump will use it to “finance the insurrectionists and paramilitary groups that commit violence in his name,” and describes its creation as “the most brazen act of presidential corruption this century.”
Where the money comes from
The fund grew out of the settlement of Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service over the leak of his tax returns. It is meant to compensate people who believe earlier administrations’ Justice Departments mistreated them. A five-member commission appointed by the attorney general will decide on payouts.
Blanche and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent are named as defendants. Spokespeople for the Justice and Treasury departments did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The riot’s toll
More than 100 police officers were injured in the Capitol attack. Over 1,600 people were charged with Jan. 6-related crimes, but Trump erased all of those cases with pardons in a sweeping act of clemency last year.
One of the officers’ attorneys is Brendan Ballou, a former Justice Department prosecutor who handled Jan. 6 cases.
Sources
- Officers who defended Capitol from rioters sue to block payouts from $1.8B ‘anti-weaponization’ fund
