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Vice President JD Vance came to Bangor last week to talk about alleged fraud that he said was costing taxpayer dollars. We respectfully suggest that he take a closer look inside the White House.
In the latest example of misuse of public funds, the Trump administration announced a $1.8 billion fund to “compensate” people who say they were mistreated by a “weaponized” government, such as those who violently stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, in hopes of overturning the results of the 2020 presidential election, which was won by Joe Biden. Donald Trump was impeached for his role in encouraging the violence on Jan. 6, although the U.S. Senate failed to convict him.
When he was again elected president in 2024, one of Trump’s first acts was to pardon more than 1,500 people who were involved in the Jan. 6 violence.
These people were not victims of a malicious government, as the president suggests. They were convicted by juries and judges or pleaded guilty to charges against them. These people, loosely following Trump’s directive to “stop the steal,” attacked law enforcement officers, injuring more than 100 of them, many of them seriously. They stormed the U.S. Capitol, doing more than $30 million in damage. Many carried weapons.
Some threatened to hang then-Vice President Mike Pence and tried to hunt down then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Members of Congress, including Republicans, hid in fear and donned gas masks.
The Jan. 6 rioters were convicted of crimes or pleaded guilty to them. Trump let them all off the hook. Many have since committed more crimes.
These are the people the Trump administration wants to compensate — with taxpayer dollars. The money will be used to compensate them for their legal fees, for supposed economic hardship and damage to their reputation, Trump said. Even the exact amount of the fund — $1.776 billion — is a reference to an insurgent rallying cry.
When asked Monday by Sen. Susan Collins about the justification for the fund, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche had the gall to compare paying the perpetrators of the Jan. 6 violence to financial compensation that was paid to Indigenous Americans who were mistreated by the U.S. government.
This is offensive and just plain wrong.
The 2010 Keepseagle settlement provided $760 million in funds to settle claims of decades-long discrimination against Native American applicants seeking low-interest farm loans from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. In a class-action lawsuit, thousands of Indigenous farmers and ranchers said they were treated differently than white farmers in the same communities. They were denied loans or given more onerous terms than nearby white farmers, the lawsuit said.
The Keepseagle funds were a court-ordered settlement, not one president’s reward to his political supporters. And, they were established to remedy a documented wrong that is part of a centuries-long pattern of mistreatment of Indigenous people in America.
The so-called “anti-weaponization fund” is only the latest example of a pattern of fraud in the Trump White House, a portion of which the president had torn down to make room for a massive ballroom. The president initially said the ballroom would cost $200 million (which quickly doubled to $400 million) to be covered by donors. He is now seeking $1 billion in taxpayer funds for the project.
A new filing with the Office of Government Ethics shows that Trump has made as much as $750 million in stock trades in recent months, much of it from trades made at the start of his war with Iran. He also bought stocks in companies as the Department of Justice negotiated takeover deals and in companies that were part of his recent trip to China. The Trump family has generated at least $4 billion in profits from new business ventures, including hotels, drone manufacturing and Bible sales, since Trump was reelected, according to the Wall Street Journal.
And, the paperwork setting up the anti-weaponization fund has already been altered to include language barring the IRS from investigating and prosecuting Trump, his children or his businesses.
“The definition of corruption is using official power for private gain. By that measure, Trump is hands down the most corrupt president in history,” Liz Oyer, a former attorney at the Department of Justice, wrote this week in her blog Lawyer Oyer.
Of course, if people and organizations are committing fraud against Medicaid (or any government program), it should be investigated and appropriate punishment levied. That is what Maine and other states are doing, albeit sometimes slowly.
However, rather than demonizing immigrants and exaggerating claims of fraud, the vice president could turn his attention to the real fraud being committed by the president right under his nose.
