In secret, behind locked gates, our Nation's Oldest City dumped a landfill in a lake (Old City Reservoir), while emitting sewage in our rivers and salt marsh. Organized citizens exposed and defeated pollution, racism and cronyism. We elected a new Mayor. We're transforming our City -- advanced citizenship. Ask questions. Make disclosures. Demand answers. Be involved. Expect democracy. Report and expose corruption. Smile! Help enact a St. Augustine National Park and Seashore. We shall overcome!
Ed Slavin nomination of U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie sent to the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library:
U.S. Rep. Thomas Harold Massie has earned the 2026 JFK Profile in Courage Award for his outstanding courage under fire in support of H.RES 581 and H.R. 185 (119th Congress), courageously enacting the bipartisan Epstein files disclosure law after a successful discharge petition. Rep. Massie exhibited rare political courage in the face of threats and retaliation from President DONALD JOHN TRUMP.. https://clerk.house.gov/DischargePetition/2025090209. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Massie
Thomas Massie
On Wednesday, May 20, 2026 at 10:26:33 AM EDT, John F. Kennedy Library Foundation <profileincourage@jfklfoundation.org> wrote:
Thank you for your nomination for the Profile in Courage Award.
Please feel free to share the nomination campaign with others! Given the volume of nominations we receive, we are unable to respond individually but we will reach out to nominators if we need additional information.
Thank you, again, for your support.
The John F. Kennedy Library Foundation Team
Your Nomination
Nominee Name: Thomas Massie
Act(s) of political courage for which your nominee is to be considered: U.S. Rep. Thomas Harold Massie has earned the JFK Profile in Courage Award for his outstanding courage under fire in support of H.RES 581 and H.R. 185 (119th Congress), courageously enacting the bipartisan Epstein files disclosure law after successful discharge petition. Rep. Massie exhibited rare political courage in the face of threats retaliation, flummery, dupery and nincompoopery from President DONALD JOHN TRUMP. and his supporters. https://clerk.house.gov/DischargePetition/2025090209. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Massie
Jan. 6 Police Officers Sue to Block Trump’s Payout Fund
The two officers accused the administration of creating a “slush fund” to reward rioters and groups that committed violence on behalf of President Trump.
Listen · 2:26 min
Officer Daniel Hodges of Washington’s Metropolitan Police, left, and Harry Dunn, then an officer with the U.S. Capitol Police, at a congressional hearing in 2022. The two filed suit on Wednesday.Credit...Kenny Holston for The New York Times
Two police officers who defended the Capitol against a pro-Trump mob on Jan. 6, 2021, sued the Trump administration on Wednesday to try to block the creation of a nearly $1.8 billion fund that they say will be used to reward the rioters and right-wing militia groups who tried to stop Congress from certifying the election results that day.
The lawsuit, filed by former Officer Harry Dunn of the U.S. Capitol Police and Officer Daniel Hodges of Washington’s Metropolitan Police, alleges that the Trump administration has created a “slush fund to finance the insurrectionists and paramilitary groups that commit violence in his name.” It names as defendants President Trump as well as acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
The suit contends the administration has exceeded its statutory authority by creating the fund without the authorization of Congress.
Trump administration officials have portrayed the fund as a way to compensate people who claim they were unfairly targeted for prosecution by the Biden Justice Department and Democrats, but it has generated widespread opposition, including from some Republicans. Critics see it as nothing more than a pipeline to funnel taxpayer money to Mr. Trump’s allies.
“Although Trump and his cronies have been secretive about the fund’s ends, reporting leaves no doubt that it will be used, among other purposes, to pay the nearly 1,600 people charged with attacking the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021,” the lawsuit says.
Mr. Dunn and Mr. Hodges were among the officers who testified before Congress about the violence they witnessed during the attack.
More than 150 officers were injured during the violence. Some were hit in the head with baseball bats, flagpoles and pipes. One lost consciousness after rioters used a metal barrier to push her down as they marched to the building.
Upon winning a second term in office, Mr. Trump issued nearly 1,600 pardons and 14 commutations for those involved in the assault on the Capitol.
As part of the Justice Department’s compensation fund deal, officials vowed not to pursue any matters, including those involving President Trump’s tax returns, that are pending.
Listen · 6:30 min
The document was signed by acting Attorney General Todd Blanche.Credit...Kenny Holston/The New York Times
The Justice Department has granted President Trump, his family and businesses immunity from ongoing inquiries into their taxes, a potentially lucrative arrangement that could shield the president from significant financial liability.
The provision, quietly inserted on Tuesday as a supplement to a remarkable deal that also created a $1.8 billion compensation fund aimed at benefiting Mr. Trump’s allies, protects the president, his relatives and his businesses from pending audits and tax prosecutions.
The one-page document, signed by the acting attorney general, Todd Blanche, said that the government would be “FOREVER BARRED and PRECLUDED from prosecuting or pursuing” pending tax claims against Mr. Trump, his family members and businesses.
The provision invited immediate criticism as tax experts raised the possibility that it was illegal.
That the addendum to the deal was posted, without fanfare, on the department’s website belied its bare-knuckled audacity. It revealed the determination of Mr. Trump and his appointees to ram through maximalist measures with minimum outside scrutiny at a moment when they still have uncontested control of government.
The provision was the latest in a series of maneuvers this week that blurred the all-but-vanished boundary between official department business and the private interests of a president intent on using his power to extract financial gain from the federal government for himself and his allies
A day earlier, Mr. Trump agreed to drop his $10 billion lawsuit against the I.R.S.in exchange for the establishment of a fundfor people he believes were wronged by federal investigations or prosecutions.
Justice Department officials had in part defended the creation of the fund by pointing to the fact that Mr. Trump and his family members would not be paid by it.
But protection from audit could be quite financially beneficial for Mr. Trump, who has always said that there was no wrongdoing in his tax filings. In 2024, The New York Times reportedthat a loss in an I.R.S. audit could cost Mr. Trump more than $100 million.
It is unclear if that examination has concluded or if Mr. Trump, his family members or affiliated entities are under other audits. I.R.S. procedures call for the mandatory audit of the president’s tax returns annually.
Neither the Justice Department nor the I.R.S. responded to requests seeking comment. The top lawyer at the Treasury, Brian Morrissey,resigned on Mondayafter the Justice Department announced the settlement with Mr. Trump.
Federal law prohibits the president, vice president and other executive officers from instructing the I.R.S. to start or stop specific audits. But thatbroad prohibition appears to include a carve out for the attorney general.
Brandon DeBot, a senior attorney adviser at New York University’s Tax Law Center, said in a statement that the audit protection may still be illegal.
“The I.R.S. would need to act to make the release of claims effective, which could raise additional questions about whether there has been unlawful political interference in the audit process,” he said. “The settlement and general release of claims is a breathtaking abuse of the tax and legal system.”
The disclosure of the provision came as blowback appeared to be mounting over the creation of the fund, including from a few Republican lawmakerstypically wary of incurring Mr. Trump’s wrath.
Senator John Thune, Republican of South Dakota and the majority leader, offered rare criticism of the president, saying he “was not a big fan” of the fund and adding that he did not see a “purpose” to it.
The Times reportedlast week that Mr. Trump’s talks with the Justice Department and the I.R.S. had included a measure calling on the I.R.S. to drop any audits of the president, his relatives or businesses. But that provision did not appear in the nine-page agreement laying out the terms to dismiss the lawsuit, which the department released on Monday.
In January, Mr. Trump, along with two of his sons and the Trump family business, sued the Internal Revenue Service for at least $10 billion over the leak of their tax returns during the president’s first term. The Trumps argued that the I.R.S. should have done more to prevent aformer contractor from disclosing tax informationto The New York Times and ProPublica.
Even as the original nine-page agreement offered scant details of how disbursement would work or who would be eligible, it said that claimants could seek money from the government for having faced reprisals for “personal, political and/or ideological reasons.” It stated that a five-person commission would consider claims based on criteria like damages a person had incurred or any time they spent in federal custody.
The main agreement also indicated that claims would largely be handed out in secrecy, requiring the fund managers to provide the attorney general on a quarterly basis with a “confidential written report” of those who received any money. The fund would stop processing claims no later than Dec. 1, 2028, just weeks before Mr. Trump is scheduled to leave office.
Frank Bisignano, the chief executive of the I.R.S., signed the original, nine-page settlement. The provisions granting Mr. Trump immunity from existing audits, though, was signed only by Mr. Blanche, who has stepped up carrying out Mr. Trump’s campaign of retribution against his enemies.
At one point, Senator Chris Van Hollen, Democrat of Maryland, repeatedly accused Mr. Blanche of behaving more like a Trump defense lawyer than an independent guardian of the public interest.
Mr. Blanche pushed back, asserting that he was “the acting attorney general.”
Mr. Van Hollen replied, “Mr. Attorney General, you are acting today like the president’s personal attorney, and that’s the whole problem.”
Alan Feuer covers extremism and political violence for The Times, focusing on the criminal cases involving the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol and against former President Donald J. Trump.
Andrew Duehren covers tax policy for The Times from Washington.
Glenn Thrush covers the Department of Justice for The Times and has also written about gun violence, civil rights and conditions in the country’s jails and prisons.
A version of this article appears in print on May 20, 2026, Section A, Page 1 of the New York edition with the headline: I.R.S. Ordered to Drop Audits Against Trump As Part of Payout Deal. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe
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