With Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche refusing to commit to a federal court in writing that the Trump "Anti-Weaponization Fund" will be canceled, he has a new problem, analyst Scott MacFarlane told MS NOW's Katy Tur on Friday: backlash from the Senate Republicans reviewing his nomination to serve as attorney general permanently.
"So the question I had earlier ... is how Republicans are going to react to this," asked Tur. "Are they still going to be content to take Todd Blanche's word for it?"
"Oh, boy, Todd Blanche has got a problem on his hands here," said MacFarlane — specifically, he said, that Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC), a prominent Judiciary Committee Republican with no real loyalty to Trump, "says he's got a slush fund issue with Todd Blanche right now. He doesn't want the slush fund moving forward." With Blanche engaging in a "sleight of hand" with the courts, MacFarlane continued, Tillis is likely to be suspicious.
"Blanche and Tillis meetearly next week, so they'regoing to be able to hash thisout," noted MacFarlane. However, he continued, "Judge Leonie Brinkema ...wanted this thing in writingfor a reason. I'm not sureshe's going to accept this five-page argument from the Trumpadministration that it'sunnecessary and has a separation-of-powers issue. I don't think the judge agrees."
Beyond that, MacFarlane said Blanche's repeated insistence that the slush fund is "not moving forward" is "all kinds of sus."
"You could have used different phrases. You could have used different terms," said MacFarlane. "You could have said you're halting it. You could have said, it's never going to happen. You could have said, it's over, not moving forward. It's just the type of passive voice that gives them room for error and room to maneuver, I should say. And I think the court filing does the same today."