June 27, 2026 - WASHINGTON, D.C. — U.S. Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, led Democratic members of the Committee in issuing an urgent warning about Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s conduct as the Senate considers his nomination to serve as Attorney General. In two separate letters, the senators urged the Judiciary Committee to preserve a scheduled Department of Justice (DOJ) oversight hearing and separately demanded answers regarding the DOJ’s proposed $1.776 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund.”

In a letter to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, Booker and all Democratic members of the Committee urged the Chairman to preserve a scheduled DOJ oversight hearing on July 21 as a standalone proceeding while it considers the nomination of Todd Blanche.

“We write to request that the Committee retain the oversight hearing of the Department of Justice scheduled for July 21, while it considers the nomination of Todd Blanche to be Attorney General. As you know, considering the nomination of a Cabinet-level official and conducting oversight of the department they lead are two distinct exercises of the Senate’s constitutional duties that have been entrusted to the Committee. One cannot be substituted for the other,” the senators wrote to Grassley.

“Mr. Blanche has played an integral role in the Department’s most outrageous actions since Watergate. Throughout his tenure at the Department of Justice, Mr. Blanche has used its power not to shield Americans from injustice, but as a sword aimed downward at the President’s perceived enemies,” they continued.

“The pendency of a nomination should not excuse the official in charge from answering for that conduct. The Committee has constitutional duties before it: to review the fitness of Mr. Blanche to lead the Department of Justice and to conduct regular oversight of the DOJ. It must honor both duties, which requires that the Committee keep its scheduled oversight hearing of the Department as a separate proceeding. The Department’s conduct demands an accounting, and the American people are entitled to one, whatever the fate of the nomination,” the senators concluded.

In a separate letter to Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, Booker was joined by Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Adam Schiff (D-CA), and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) in requesting information and documents regarding the DOJ’s proposed $1.776 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund” and whether DOJ violated its own internal settlement principles to establish the Fund.

“At your direction, the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced an ‘Anti-Weaponization Fund,’ drawn from taxpayer money, as part of a purported ‘settlement’ of the sitting President’s $10 billion collusive lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). Contrary to the legal advice of career civil servants in the IRS Office of Chief Counsel to seek dismissal of the President’s lawsuit against an agency within his control, and days after court-appointed amici counsel enumerated myriad reasons for dismissal, the Department announced the settlement before the court could act. This is an act of corruption shocking even for this Administration,” the senators wrote to Blanche.

The senators rejected Blanche’s claims to Congress that the Department “is not moving forward with the fund, period,” noting that Blanche has “refused both to commit in writing before Congress to ending the fund and to submit a sworn declaration requested by a federal court. The record makes clear that DOJ did not abandon this fund because it was unlawful, but because ongoing litigation and political backlash rendered its pursuit untenable, at least for the moment.”

“The ‘Anti-Weaponization Fund’ is plainly illegal. At a bare minimum, the establishment of the fund violates requirements the Department itself has imposed on settlements that direct payments to non-governmental third parties in the Justice Manual,” they added.

“Your actions to create the Anti-Weaponization Fund raise every concern that DOJ’s rules limiting third-party settlements were designed to address. These rules exist to prevent DOJ from abusing its broad settlement authority to direct funds to preferred non-governmental entities, an abuse that improperly circumvents the congressional appropriations process and that members of both parties have long condemned. The Justice Manual violations described above represent only one dimension of the illegality of this fund. As additional details emerge, rest assured that we will continue to pursue answers,” the senators concluded.

To read the full text of the letter to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, click here.

To read the full text of the letter to Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, click here.

Source: Senator Cory Booker