WASHINGTON — Top Republicans aren’t eager to discuss the prospect of President Donald Trump ordering his own administration to pay him as much as $10 billion in a legal settlement.
Trump sued the Internal Revenue Service in January, after he’d been back in office a year, over the unlawful release of his tax returns by a government contractor during his first term. The New York Times reported this week that Trump’s attorneys are in settlement talks with the Justice Department, aiming to reach an agreement before a judge has a chance to throw the case out.
Though Trump sued for $10 billion — a sum that would double his net worth, which has already grown by leaps and bounds during his presidency because of his family’s cryptocurrency investments — it seems unlikely he will ultimately receive such a large payout.
On Wednesday, Republicans largely tried to dodge questions about the case, which presents a clear conflict of interest for a president who has claimed unprecedented amounts of direct authority over government agencies, including the IRS and the Justice Department. The GOP is already facing political headaches over a different aspect of Trump’s self-aggrandizement, with many Republicans balking at spending $1 billion on his ballroom project.
“One of the things that is not in my purview is the Department of Justice and how they evaluate cases,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said Wednesday in response to a question from HuffPost. “I haven’t thought about that or read into it. I got enough to say grace over every day. Go ask the executive branch about it.”
The White House did not respond to a request for comment on Wednesday. The Justice Department said it doesn’t comment on pending litigation.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, the current leader of the Justice Department and a former personal attorney of Trump’s, ignored a question about the case when he visited the Capitol on Wednesday.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said he was unfamiliar with the case. He asked HuffPost to clarify whether Trump’s complaint asked for $10 million or $10 billion and seemed surprised by the answer.
“Billion. Ten billion. That is news to me,” Thune said before walking into his office.
“It’s like negotiating with yourself how much money I’m gonna owe me. I don’t think it’s right.”
– Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.)
Trump has suggested he would donate the funds from the lawsuit to charity. The Times reported that one settlement option would involve no monetary compensation but require the IRS to cease all audits of Trump’s and his family members’ tax returns. The president has separately demanded that the Justice Department pay him $230 million for its criminal investigations of him after his first presidency.
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said the IRS consultant who leaked Trump’s tax information to reporters got off easy. The D.C. resident was sentenced to five years in prison for disclosing tax information about thousands of wealthy individuals, including Trump.
“What happened to the president is as wrong as it gets,” Jordan told HuffPost. “The guy who did it, that guy got next to nothing. So I can understand why the president is ticked about it.”
Trump broke with years of precedent by not voluntarily releasing his tax returns when he first ran for president and then after assuming office. The New York Times used the information it obtained to show how Trump used business losses to avoid paying taxes.
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), the top Democrat on the judiciary committee, said it would arguably not be improper if the president went to court, proved his case and was awarded damages by a jury. But settling out of court would be unethical.
“It is an outrageous conflict of interest, obviously,” Raskin told HuffPost. “The basic principle of American jurisprudence is that you can’t be a judge in your own case.”
Raskin said Trump accepting payment from the government beyond his salary would also violate the Constitution’s domestic Emoluments Clause, which says the president’s pay can’t be increased or diminished during his term. Raskin and other Democrats introduced legislation last month to ban the president and vice president from collecting settlements from the government.
Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.), a moderate Republican who is not running for reelection, said he was unfamiliar with the president’s legal complaint, but didn’t hesitate to criticize the idea of the Trump administration settling with Trump’s personal attorneys.
“It’s like negotiating with yourself how much money I’m gonna owe me. I don’t think it’s right. I think it looks bad,” Bacon said.
U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams, who is overseeing the case in the Southern District of Florida, set a deadline of May 20 for the parties to submit memorandums addressing whether the court even has jurisdiction and whether the president has a conflict of interest. “[A]lthough President Trump avers that he is bringing this lawsuit in his personal capacity, he is the sitting president and his named adversaries are entities whose decisions are subject to his direction,” she pointed out.
If Williams, nominated by President Barack Obama in 2011, decides the two parties in the case aren’t actually opponents, she could toss the lawsuit entirely.
So far, the government hasn’t responded in court. Trump’s attorneys said in a filing last month that the two sides are “in discussions designed to resolve this matter and to avoid protracted litigation.” Williams likely wouldn’t have any say over a private settlement.