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Attorney General nominee Todd Blanche has a tough task in front of him at his confirmation hearing on Wednesday: winning over two Republican senators who still have reservations about his nomination.
Both Sens. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and Thom Tillis, R-N.C., told Semafor on Tuesday that they will have some hard questions for Blanche, particularly after Judge Kathleen Williams upbraided him this week for the deal that gave Trump tax immunity and created the $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” fund.
Cornyn wants to know how that deal came together, though his current position on Blanche is inscrutable.
Tillis said he’s “working hard to maintain my yes position” — but only if Blanche stomps on the grave of Trump’s supposedly defunct $1.8 billion fund. “I have to be convinced that there is no way that that zombie can come out of a closet,” Tillis said.
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Cornyn has been more fixated on the tax immunity deal; he said he received a follow-up briefing from Blanche after meeting with him last month. But that came before Williams’ stinging comments about the settlement between the Justice Department and IRS.
Cornyn said he’s going to “ask as many questions about that as I can. And get some clarity.”
“The potentially collusive nature of the proceeding itself causes some questions. For example, there wasn’t any real attempt, it looked like, to defend against the case based on the statute limitations,” Cornyn said. He added that he’s seeking to strike the “right balance” by giving Trump deference for his nominees. “There are limits to that, obviously,” he added.
Tillis might be easier to win over — as long as Blanche doesn’t equivocate on the mostly-abandoned fund. Tillis also said the reason for his “positive predisposition for Blanche” is their work together to de-escalate the Trump administration’s probe of former Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell.
And he said that, on further review, Blanche’s remarks to a conservative conference touting Jan. 6 pardons are not disqualifying.
The fund, however, is a red line for Tillis.
“It’s really lousy policy. But it’s even worse politics,” Tillis said. “There is no way anybody on the stump can explain this. ‘So, Senator Tillis, what do you think about the president being willing to give money to people to beat the hell out of cops?’”