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President Donald Trump unleashed more fury on a Senate Republican he worked to oust who is standing in the way of his personal lawyer becoming the next attorney general.
Trump unloaded on Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, over acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s stalled nomination Friday morning, a day after threatening to withdraw Blanche’s nomination from the Senate.
He accused Cornyn of previously having no issue with the nearly $2 billion anti-weaponization fund, one of the issues that he and Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., are trying to kill, before Trump endorsed Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in their grueling primary showdown.
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Trump accused Cornyn of backing the nearly $2 billion anti-weaponization fund before Trump endorsed Paxton. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty Images; Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
“John Cornyn never had a problem with the so-called ‘Fund,’ which will not benefit me, but rather the great American Patriots who were hunted down like dogs and whose lives were unfairly and illegally destroyed by the Crooked Joe Biden Administration, until after I decided to Endorse and Support his Republican Primary opponent in Texas, who easily won the Nomination for the United States Senate,” Trump said on Truth Social.
Fox News Digital did not immediately receive comment from Cornyn’s office in response to Trump’s remarks.
Cornyn and Tillis are both pushing the Department of Justice (DOJ) and administration to provide explicit, written proposals to permanently nix and rewrite the anti-weaponization fund and Trump’s audit immunity, respectively, that were borne from his settlement deal with the IRS, which Blanche rolled out earlier this year.
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The Texas Republican, in particular, wants changes to Trump’s audit immunity spelled out in the deal, and has so far not had his demands met as paper continues to flow back and forth between the lawmakers and administration.
But the lawmakers contend that there’s a force above Blanche that is thwarting the process and further slowing down his confirmation.
“I thought we were pretty close to landing the plane last night, but this morning there’s been some more complications,” Cornyn told reporters on Thursday. “I think if this were just between me and Todd Blanche, we would have worked this out. But apparently he’s getting some pushback from higher-ups at the White House. I don’t know who, but this doesn’t need to be this hard.”
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Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche gets sworn in at his confirmation hearing in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee on Capitol Hill. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)
Trump appeared unwilling to part with the fund, which has been condemned by Republicans and Democrats over concerns that it would dole out taxpayer dollars to rioters who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
“I will always feel that these victims of government abuse should be paid back for what they were forced to endure, their lives have been ruined,” Trump said. “Millions of people agree with me, as was proven in my landslide Presidential win, where this was a major subject of debate, and so did John Cornyn, until he lost his Election to an opponent that I Endorsed. Todd Blanche, a good man, should be immediately approved as U.S. Attorney General.”
Both Cornyn and Tillis met with Blanche toward the end of the day Thursday to continue hashing out a path forward.
Meanwhile, Trump threatened to yank Blanche’s nomination from the Senate over the impasse after Senate Judiciary Chair Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, postponed his confirmation hearing scheduled for Thursday.
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His plan would be to wait until both Cornyn and Tillis are out of office next year. But, there’s no guarantee that the Senate would be more welcoming to Blanche after the midterm elections this November.
And Tillis and Cornyn aren’t the only Republicans with reservations about Blanche — Sens. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, and John Curtis, R-Utah, are both on the fence on whether to support him on a full floor vote in the Senate.
Given universal Democratic opposition, their resistance could sink his chances.