President Trump may be on the verge of turning one of the ugliest government leak scandals in recent memory into a political and legal reckoning for the federal bureaucracy — and the left is already clutching its pearls.
According to reports Thursday night, Trump is expected to drop his blockbuster $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service if the federal government agrees to create a massive compensation fund worth roughly $1.7 billion for Americans who say they were railroaded by the Biden-era justice machine.
And yes — that reportedly includes Jan. 6 defendants.
The proposed fund would compensate conservatives and Trump allies who claim they were unfairly targeted during the Biden administration’s years-long obsession with “domestic extremism,” MAGA prosecutions and endless Trump investigations. The people overseeing the fund would reportedly have broad authority to distribute taxpayer money to claimants, including nearly 1,600 individuals charged in connection with the Capitol riot.
That’s a staggering reversal from the media narrative Americans were force-fed for years: that every Jan. 6 defendant was untouchable, irredeemable and beyond political sympathy. Now the same federal government that spent years throwing the book at Trump supporters could end up cutting checks.
Not exactly the ending MSNBC promised.
The legal mess stems from the shocking leak of Trump’s confidential tax records during his first term — a breach that conservatives long argued was brushed aside because the victim happened to be Donald Trump.
Back in 2020, The New York Times published details from the leaked returns, including the headline-grabbing claim that Trump paid just $750 in federal income taxes in both 2016 and 2017. The disclosures ignited a media feeding frenzy and became instant ammunition for Democrats during the election cycle.
But the leak itself was no small clerical error.
Charles Littlejohn, a former IRS contractor employed through Booz Allen, eventually admitted to illegally disclosing private taxpayer information tied to Trump and other wealthy Americans. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced last year to five years in prison — the maximum penalty available.
For many conservatives, that sentence never answered the bigger question: how did one politically motivated contractor gain access to confidential records, leak them to left-wing media outlets and trigger a years-long political firestorm with seemingly zero institutional safeguards stopping him?
Trump’s legal team hasn’t exactly softened its view.
“The IRS wrongly allowed a rogue, politically-motivated employee to leak private and confidential information about President Trump, his family, and the Trump Organization to the New York Times, ProPublica and other left-wing news outlets, which was then illegally released to millions of people,” a spokesperson for Trump’s attorneys said. “President Trump continues to hold those who wrong America and Americans accountable.”
The settlement discussions have reportedly been underway inside the Department of Justice, which represents the IRS in the case. The deal is not finalized, but sources say the compensation fund is the key demand Trump wants satisfied before walking away from multiple legal claims against the federal government.
And this isn’t the only grievance Trump wants addressed.
The president is also reportedly seeking roughly $230 million tied to the FBI’s Russia investigation and the bureau’s 2022 Mar-a-Lago raid — two episodes conservatives still view as defining examples of Washington’s selective justice system.
Ironically, the same establishment figures who spent years insisting “no one is above the law” now appear horrified that government agencies might finally face consequences when they abuse their power.
Funny how that works.
