Donald Trump and maga Republicans want Americans tax money to create a slush fund to support convicted criminals!

Trump’s 💲1.8 Billion Slush Fund Is Worse Than Stealing

Definition: an unofficial, loosely regulated pool of money set aside for unspecified, discretionary, or illicit purposes

Recasting the January 6 insurrection as the work of heroic patriots remains the president’s highest priority. Published in The Atlantic, by Jonathan Chait

Among the very first things Donald Trump did upon assuming the powers of the presidency for the second time was commute the sentences of, and grant pardons to, everybody involved in his attempt to overturn the 2020, election. 😡😠 Republican allies expressed moderate disappointment but vowed to move past this ugly blemish. Senator Susan Collins called it a “terrible day for our Justice Department.” Senator Tommy Tuberville admitted, “It’s a hard one, because we work with them up here,” referring to Capitol Police who were viciously beaten by Trump’s allies. Tuberville concluded, “At the end of the day, we’ve got to get January 6, behind us.” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said that Republicans were “not looking backwards; we’re looking forward.”

It was not, however, just one terrible day. Trump’s loyalty to his most violent and criminal supporters was a signal of his highest priority and has been a reliable guide to his decisions ever since. The impulse to rewrite the history of January 6, 2021, appears to be the inspiration even for the establishment of a 💲1.8 billion Treasury Department slush fund ❗for victims of so-called weaponization of government.

Last week, when the administration floated the notion of disbursing payments to alleged victims of government weaponization, cynics assumed that Trump meant to divert the money to himself. But this assessment may have turned out to be too naïve. Trump already has ample ways to profit from office, including from stock trading with the benefit of inside knowledge and by accepting gifts from client states. The Justice Department told reporters yesterday that Trump, his sons, and his family business would not receive payments from the fund. The recipients will almost surely be insurrectionists and other Trumpzi allies.

How, exactly, can Trump hand out taxpayer dollars at his whim❓ The putative mechanism is a settlement with the Internal Revenue Service. In 2020, an IRS contractor leaked a few years of Trump’s tax records. (Before Trump, major presidential candidates had for decades voluntarily released their returns, an essential step in demonstrating that they had no conflicts of interest.)

The contractor was caught and sent to prison. Trump, nevertheless, sued for the offense of being subjected to a portion of the scrutiny his fellow candidates have voluntarily undergone. 

Because Trump runs the IRS, it is no longer in a position to place any limits on his demands. He has already exploited the loophole of suing his own government to pay a series of allies investigated for or convicted of committing crimes out of loyalty to him. The recipients include the family of Ashli Babbitt, an insurrectionist who was shot and killed on January 6, while smashing her way into a corridor behind which members of Congress had taken shelter from the mob.

Trump’s Justice Department describes the forthcoming payouts as a “systematic process to hear and redress claims of others who suffered weaponization and lawfare.” The process is, in fact, the opposite of systemic. It is designed to be controlled personally by Trump and sheltered from any judicial scrutiny.

If the government were actually compensating victims of lawfare, it would direct payments to James Comey, Mark Kelly, Adam Schiff, and other targets of Trump’s vindictive prosecutions. 

Trump has described his actions as turnabout—“I was hunted by some very bad people. Now I’m the hunter.”—which, given that he has called his own prosecutions political targeting, is tantamount to confessing that he is targeting his enemies.

But, of course, nobody entertains for a moment the thought that the fund could conceivably reward an actual victim of weaponization. To ensure that it will never be used for a deserving victim, the fund is scheduled for termination on December 15, 2028.

Asked by a reporter yesterday whether people who committed violence against police officers should receive payments, Trump replied, “It’ll all be dependent on a committee. A committee’s being set up of very talented people, very highly respected people.” The committee is being selected entirely by Trump, who retains the power to replace any member who displeases him, and who in any case has argued in multiple contexts that he is entitled to exert full control over any decision by the executive branch.

The most dystopian explanation for this scheme comes from sources who sketched it out to ABC News last week. As ABC’s reporters characterized it, the sources described the fund as “a hybrid between a victim compensation fund—similar to the civil claims process that followed the 2010, Deepwater Horizon oil spill—and a truth-and-reconciliation-style commission.”

Trump’s commission is deviously inverting the original and most famous truth-and-reconciliation commission. South Africa established its commission to document the crimes committed under its apartheid regime. Rather than uncovering the truth to facilitate the state’s transformation from authoritarianism into democracy, Trump is doing the reverse, inscribing his lies into the historical record in an effort to undermine democracy.

It is common to describe Trump’s steps as vengeance, but he has more in mind than merely settling old scores. This obsession drove Trump to support a successful primary challenge to Senator Bill Cassidy, whose offense was casting a symbolic vote to impeach him after January 6. Cassidy had long since surrendered any independent impulses, to the point of violating his own pro-vaccine convictions to cast a humiliating, decisive vote to confirm (the idiot❗) Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as secretary of health and human services. Yet Cassidy’s penitence did not satisfy Trump.

Trump considers it essential both to intimidate anybody who would stop him from carrying out illegal orders—hence his attempts to imprison Democrats who truthfully advised military members that they should not obey illegal orders—and to reward anybody who does follow them. He has reportedly promised mass pardons before he leaves office. Trump could have waited until after the 2028, elections to set up his slush fund, but he is doing it now in a high-profile way, presumably to communicate directly that loyal allies can expect lavish rewards.

The government’s operating ethos during Trump’s second term has followed the dictum that the president and his allies are immune from the law, while his enemies can expect to be hounded. As his party watches silently and cowers, his intentions grow only more naked.💢😡😱

Christian churches in Canada and Europe are empty because politics became embroiled in religion. Americans will see the same happen here.

IRS takes a step toward giving Christian pastors a bully pulpit. 
An article and opinion letter published in the Boston Globe:

Pastors who endorse political candidates shouldn’t lose tax-exempt status, IRS (Internal Revenue Service) says in filing. The Christian media group and others filed suit against the IRS last August, stating that the amendment violates their First Amendment rights to the freedom of speech and free exercise of religion, among other legal protections.

Maine Writer comment:  This decision, if allowed to stand will continue to divide an already bulkanized nation. Canadians long ago gave up on organized religion, even though every community has either a church, basicilica or a Cathedral, they are largely empty.  Canadians go to church for weddings, baptisms and funerals.  In Europe, the churches are empty tourist attractions. There is a reason for this abandonment of formal religion....because....the government was controlling the pulpit through the clergy.  There is no freedom of speech when the pastors are told what to preach.  

The recent IRS decision to allow religious organizations to endorse political candidates without losing their tax-exempt status contradicts a change to the tax code passed in 1954 known as the Johnson Amendment (“IRS: Pastors who endorse candidates shouldn’t lose tax-exempt status,” Business, July 9). The amendment, named after Lyndon Johnson, then a senator, prohibits tax-exempt entities from participating in political campaigns.

This decision emerged as a consent agreement to settle a lawsuit by the National Religious Broadcasters Association and two Texas churches, which claimed the amendment infringed on their First Amendment rights. However, this policy shift disregards federal law, opens the door for misuse of tax-exempt status for partisan purposes, and creates another pathway for secret spending in our elections.

By interpreting political discussions during worship as private conversations, the IRS creates a loophole that will lead to organizations seeking tax breaks in exchange for political support and introduce hidden sources of money into elections. Any decision to invalidate the Johnson Amendment should be made through debate in Congress, not through back-channel agreements.

The IRS must adhere to the US tax code as established by Congress and ensure any modifications arise from transparent, democratic processes. We need less dark money in politics, not more.

From Cushing Anderson in Boston

Tax cuts for the rich benefit 1 percent of people - increases national debt by $1 Trillion a year

Republican tax cuts are daylight robbery- A graphic published in The Boston Globe 

The following letter to the editor is an echo opinion from Nebraska published in the McCook Gazette

Who really benefits from tax cuts?
Every tax system creates winners and losers.

The 2017 Trump tax reform gave 83% of the tax cuts to the richest 1% of the people.

This number has not been challenged by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), the General Accounting Office (GAO), the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and the non-partisan Tax Foundation. The American population is 330 million people.

The 83% tax cut goes to 3,300,000, out of 330,000,000 people. The net result reduces the progressive nature of our tax system and increases our debt by one trillion dollars a year. Thus, tax revenue shrinks and more borrowed money is used to pay entitlement programs like Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security.

This further increases the gap between the richest 1% and the rest of us. If Donald Trump truly wanted to help the middle class he would have permanently cut payroll taxes. Instead, he implemented loopholes like the pass-through, reduced capital gains tax, and retained the carried interest provision.

Corporations which are plush with cash borrow money and write-off the interest on their debt.

Meanwhile, these low-interest rates, punish the little people who hold their money in bank accounts and CDs. The Trump tax cuts follow two major tax cuts by the George W. Bush administration. Rather than investing money in research and development and job creation, corporations have rewarded stockholders and CEOs with stock buybacks, stock options, and increased dividends rather than wages increases.

Over 90% of stock is held by 10% of the American people and foreign corporations. American companies have shifted risk to their employees by moving from a system of defined benefits to one of defined contributions.

Rather than increasing wages, they are giving one-time bonuses. President Trump has attempted to replace affordable healthcare with bare bones minimum coverage plans which do not guarantee coverage of preconditions. This is how he plans to reduce the cost of healthcare.

Tax cuts which dramatically increase the national debt when there is already full employment are contrary to traditional economic theory. When interest rates go up the cost of financing the national debt goes up accordingly.

Tariffs on imported goods increase inflation. Inflation eats up the little guy's tax cuts. Your paycheck may be a little larger, but you will end up with less purchasing power and a lower standard of living.

Mr. Trump says “the best is yet to come.” (MaineWriter- is this a "recession alert"?)

Is it?  Roger Green
Scottsbluff, Neb.