From Ohio Capital Journal, Jacob Fischler,  May 22: Two police officers who defended the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, sued the Trump administration Wednesday to block the creation of a nearly $1.8 billion fund to pay people said to be victims of judicial weaponization, saying the fund would aid and encourage the pro-Trump rioters who attacked that Capitol that day and still harbor desire to harm the officers. Retired U.S. Capitol Police Officer Harry Dunn and Metropolitan Police Officer Daniel Hodges said in a complaint in federal court that Jan. 6 rioters, nearly all of whom received a pardon from President Donald Trump on his first day back in office last year, could benefit from the fund and use the money to organize more violent activity. “In the most brazen act of presidential corruption this century, President Donald J. Trump has created a $1.776 billion taxpayer-funded slush fund to finance the insurrectionists and paramilitary groups that commit violence in his name,” the first paragraph of the complaint reads. The complaint lists Trump, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent as defendants. The Justice Department, which Blanche has led since last month, announced the creation of the fund on Monday in conjunction with Trump dropping a $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS. The fund would use money from a pool designated for settling legal claims against the federal government to compensate people who were “victims of lawfare and weaponization,” Blanche said in a press release. Trump has long complained that the Biden administration targeted him, his allies and supporters for prosecutions that were not supported by facts on the ground. That claim was part of his rationale for pardoning people convicted of crimes on Jan. 6. The press release explicitly says there is no partisan test to benefit from the fund, but the structure gives Trump and Blanche, who was Trump’s criminal defense attorney before joining the government, near total control. Payments from the fund would be decided by a five-member panel, which the attorney general would appoint. Only one appointment would require “consultation” with Congress and the president would be able to fire any member. The fund would dissolve in December 2028, the month before Trump’s term ends. Dunn and Hodges said in Wednesday’s challenge that Trump’s IRS lawsuit was frivolous from the start because the president was suing a government agency that he controlled. The suit also came after the statute of limitations expired, they said. The settlement “is a corrupt sham,” they said.