Self-dealing slush fund, paid for by taxpayers
May 23, 2026 CORRUPTION IRS settlement or self-serve fountain of fraud? In a brazen act of self-dealing, the administration announced a settlement had been reached between the IRS and President Trump, who had sued the agency for $10 billion over leaked tax records. POGO had filed an amicus brief questioning the constitutional merits and obvious conflicts of interest in the case, as Trump was essentially suing himself and controlling both sides of the litigation. The lawsuit was unlikely to survive a trial. But the settlement is even more blatantly corrupt. It “forever” bars the IRS from examining the president’s past tax returns and creates a $1.8 billion slush fund that will likely “funnel taxpayer money to President Trump’s allies” with no obvious criteria or oversight. The “self-dealing settlement” has brought sharp rebukes from both sides of the aisle ...