A mob of Trump supporters gather outside the US Capitol in Washington, DC on January 6, 2021. In May 2026, an “anti-gun” fund was created by the Justice Department that could make payments to those involved in the January 6 attack. (Photo by Jon Cherry/Getty Images)
President Donald Trump’s extraordinary $1.776 billion fund to pay off allies and others who say they were wronged by previous administrations has drawn widespread condemnation from opponents, including some Republicans, who call it an act of brazen corruption.
But the Trump administration urge to reward His supporters also recall an earlier era of American cronyism, experts say, while expanding the boundaries of political favoritism.
From the early years of the United States until well into the 19th century, the federal government was governed by a spoils system. Presidents distributed jobs to supporters and filled the bureaucracy with workers who had demonstrated loyalty to the ruling government.
For example, Trump’s political idol, President Andrew Jackson, replaced numerous federal officials after his inauguration in 1829. A candidate for a position at the Port of New York made out with more than $1 million, worth tens of millions today.
The comparison is not exact. The spoils system involved the distribution of government positions to political allies, a practice known as patronage. Instead, Trump’s up-to-date fund would funnel taxpayer money directly to beneficiaries.
But scholars who have studied the spoils system and the presidency see parallels between the past and present—with at the heart the desire to reward allies and build loyalty.
“It seems to me that that might be the common element here,” said Sidney Shapiro, a law professor at Wake Forest University who wrote before the 2024 election that Trump wanted to reintroduce the spoils system. “It appears that President Trump is thinking about using the fund to reward people who have been unfairly punished, but in my opinion he is being unfairly punished because they tried to support him.”
Five-member board appointed by Trump
The Ministry of Justice announced The anti-gun fund, which critics call a “slush fund,” was created on May 18 as it sought to resolve a lawsuit Trump filed in his personal capacity against the IRS over a former agency employee’s disclosure of his tax returns.
The lawsuit put Trump in the highly unusual position of effectively negotiating with himself, as he has erased the DOJ’s post-Watergate tradition of independence from the White House.
Even before the agreement, the Justice Department under Trump had taken measures that would have been unthinkable in other recent administrations. For example, federal prosecutors have opened a case against former FBI Director James Comey and sought to bring criminal charges against New York Democratic Attorney General Letitia James.
The DOJ also secured an indictment against the Southern Poverty Law Center, a regular critic of Republican politicians.
Trump’s settlement agreement calls for the fund to be established under the supervision of a five-member panel selected by acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, who previously served as Trump’s personal attorney. Trump can fire members for any reason.
The fund’s board will have the authority to decide on payments and issue formal apologies. Applications submitted to the fund must be processed by December 1, 2028, before the end of Trump’s term.
On January 6, rioters line up
A throng of Trump supporters and supporters have said they plan to seek compensation. This includes individuals who stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, disrupting Congress’ certification of President Joe Biden’s Electoral College victory. Trump before pardoned rioters when he took office in January 2025.
Former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio, who was convicted of seditious conspiracy and sentenced to 22 years in prison before Trump pardoned him, predicted A recent podcast states that “many J6ers will spend their money on firearms.”
Trump described the fund as an act of generosity on his part because the settlement agreement did not provide for any financial payout to him.
However, Blanche also signed a document barring any further audit of the president’s past tax history, a move that shields him from audits. The New York Times and ProPublica reported In 2024, Trump could have owed $100 million if he had lost an audit dispute over improper tax breaks.
“I spent a lot of money approving the anti-gun fund I just announced. I could have settled my case, including the illegal release of my tax returns and the equally illegal BURGLARY of Mar-a-Lago, for an absolute fortune,” Trump said wrote on Truth Social, referencing the FBI search of his Florida residence in 2022.
“Instead, I’m helping others who have been so badly mistreated by an evil, corrupt, and armed Biden administration finally get JUSTICE!”
Trump has taken a “patrimonial” approach to governing, James Pfiffner, a professor emeritus at George Mason University who has studied the presidency, wrote in an email to States Newsroom.
Benefits, such as federal contracts, go to those who are steadfast, Pfiffner wrote, and the government is treated as if it were a family business and the state’s resources were his personal property.
The “anti-gun fund” represents an expansion of this approach, Pfiffner wrote, but also goes further than previous presidents. He wrote that he knew of no past precedent in the newfangled presidency for such blatant exploit of taxpayer money to potentially reward loyalists.
“At least in the spoils system, the people hired by the government worked and presumably did their job,” Pfiffner wrote. “The beneficiaries of this fund did nothing to deserve their benefits, and presumably some are being rewarded for committing crimes to overturn the 2020 election.”
After the assassination of President James Garfield by a spurned job seeker in 1881, Congress began curbing the spoils system.
Over the next two decades, many federal offices were converted to a civil service system. While the federal government still includes about 4,000 Although there are political appointees today, the huge majority of the bureaucracy is made up of civil servants.
Critics and defenders in Congress
But it’s unclear whether Congress will block Trump’s funds despite intense backlash.
Anger among Republican senators has led to the stalled action on immigration funding legislation that Democrats would have used to force votes on amendments to block the fund. Democrats have introduced several bills aimed at stopping this.
“Congress cannot stand idly by as Trump turns the federal government into a political operation for his friends and cronies,” Sen. Michael Bennet, a Democrat from Colorado, said in a statement.
Obstacles to Congressional action exist. Even if Republicans, who control both chambers, voted with Democrats, Trump could veto passed bills that impose limits on the fund, which would require a two-thirds majority in the House and Senate to overturn.
And some Republican lawmakers have defended the fund.
On May 21, Sen. Tommy Tuberville, a Republican from Alabama, objected to a unanimous consent motion from Sen. Alex Padilla, a California Democrat, to pass legislation that would ban payments to Jan. 6 rioters.
“Thankfully, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and the Trump Justice Department have established a standardized and lawful process to hear American citizens who have suffered crime or gun abuse under the Biden administration,” Tuberville said on the Senate floor.
Lawsuits have been filed against the fund and its structure. Two police officers who defended the Capitol on January 6th have complainedand warned that rioters could exploit the money to organize.
Fund temporarily blocked
On Friday, a federal judge in Virginia ordered the Trump administration stop work She needs to draw on the fund for at least two weeks while she considers ordering a longer break.
The decision came as part of a lawsuit brought by a former federal prosecutor who was fired by the DOJ and a California professor who was charged but acquitted with assaulting a federal officer after protesting an immigration search.
Legal advocacy groups also argue that Congress had no intention of using federal money for these types of payouts.
“Another similarity is that we as taxpayers fund both,” Shapiro, the Wake Forest professor, said of the spoils system and the Trump fund. “We are definitely funding the jobs that people have and now we are funding this fund.”
