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Trump floats temporarily withdrawing Blanche’s AG nomination over GOP holdouts

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles Grassley (R-IA), Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) attend a Finance Committee hearing on July 30, 2026, in Washington, DC. Cornyn is withholding support for President Donald Trump’s nominee for U.S. attorney general, Todd Blanche, until he gets reassurances on Trump’s IRS lawsuit settlement and the elimination of the “anti-weaponization fund.” (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump on Thursday floated the possibility of temporarily withdrawing Todd Blanche’s nomination for attorney general as his confirmation is being held up by two outgoing Republican senators.

“Todd Blanche is a STAR, and everyone knows it! He has the potential to go down as one of the Greatest Attorney Generals of All Time. However, John Cornyn, of Texas, and Thom Tillis, of North Carolina, both of whom I refused to Endorse, and whose political careers have been ended by my action, are refusing to vote for this Great Nominee, who will remain, in any event, as Acting,” Trump wrote in a social media post.

“I have no objection to temporarily withdrawing Todd’s name, if they do not do the right thing, and putting him back after Cornyn and Tillis are out of office,” Trump wrote.

Both senators’ terms will end in January. Cornyn lost a primary battle in Texas earlier this year after Trump endorsed his opponent, Ken Paxton. Tillis announced last year he would not seek reelection after Trump threatened to field primary challengers.

Cornyn, in response to Trump’s social media post, suggested that, in addition to him and Tillis, there are more lawmakers with “concerns” regarding Blanche.

“POTUS is mistaken if he believes concerns about the provisions in his tax lawsuit settlement are limited to me and Senator Tillis,” Cornyn wrote on X. 

Cornyn is demanding the Department of Justice put in writing that the nearly $1.8 billion so-called “Anti-Weaponization Fund” is officially dead, and that the scope of Trump’s immunity deal with the IRS be narrowed.

As part of Trump’s settlement with the IRS in his $10 billion lawsuit against the agency, the DOJ issued an addendum, signed by Blanche in his role as acting attorney general, that would bar the government from continuing any existing audits of tax returns filed by Trump, his family and their companies.

“I know that Todd Blanche understands it, but I think he’s probably getting some pushback from the White House, and that’s making things more complicated than there needs to be,” Cornyn told ABC News on Thursday morning.

Cornyn said he wanted the DOJ to rewrite the IRS settlement agreement itself and said they were “reluctant” to do so. Cornyn then said he offered them an alternative.

“So we provided some additional paper…which, if he would put that in writing, would satisfy my concerns because he said the weaponization fund is dead. He said the audit protections don’t extend beyond the parties in the lawsuit, and it doesn’t cover any federal entities,” the senator said.

When asked by a reporter if the DOJ committed to doing that, Cornyn said “no.”

“I don’t know whether they think they can wait us out or we’ll cave, but I assure you, we won’t,” Cornyn said.

Tillis said the administration could “roll the dice” and wait out his and Cornyn’s Senate terms, but said Trump is getting bad advice on how to proceed with Blanche’s nomination.

“Hey, 158 days they can try it again, roll the dice on what the Senate confirmation process looks like next year. It’s all on him. It’s certainly within his authority to do that,” Tillis said.

The Senate Judiciary Committee postponed its scheduled Thursday vote on Blanche’s nomination for attorney general amid the resistance from Cornyn and Tillis.

Sources told ABC News that DOJ sent an updated proposal to the two senators last night to try and quell their concerns. 

But when we asked on Thursday morning whether Wednesday night’s proposal moved him any closer to voting for Blanche, Cornyn responded, “We are no closer than we were before.”

Withdrawing Blanche’s nomination is a decision that would have no consequence in terms of Blanche leading the DOJ. Blanche can continue to serve as acting attorney general.

Acting department officials can serve in the role for 210 days, according to the Federal Vacancies Reform Act — however, that resets if a nomination is withdrawn.

Copyright © 2026, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Judge in Don Lemon indictment asks to see grand jury records, adding to growing scrutiny of Justice Department cases

By CNN
(CNN) — A federal judge in Minnesota will probe this week whether grounds exist to toss the Justice Department’s case against journalist Don Lemon. It’s the latest example of judges’ growing skepticism of whether the department is behaving ethically behind closed doors in grand jury proceedings.Judges across the country have signaled they are willing to give far less deference to federal prosecutors than in previous administrations and have raised concerns about DOJ’s apparent abandonment of regular practices.Federal judges in Wyoming, Illinois and Virginia have either thrown out charges or seriously admonished federal prosecutors for missteps in front of the grand jury. The botched grand jury presentments have prompted a historical review of cases in Chicago and, in some courts, new rules requiring defendants to be notified when a grand jury declines to indict.On August 18, Minnesota federal Judge Laura Provinzino issued a short but extraordinary order demanding the Justice Department provide her a wide swath of grand jury materials related to Lemon and his co-defendants, including presentations made by prosecutors and case agents, and the totality of communications prosecutors had with grand jurors resulting in their indictments.Provinzino set a Tuesday deadline to provide her with the presentation by federal prosecutors and case agents related to grand juries empaneled in January and February. Further, Provinzino told DOJ to provide any introduction, legal instructions, witness testimony, closing arguments, and answers to questions from grand jurors.Lemon’s team has aggressively pursued obtaining grand jury materials and had asked for either grand jury records to be provided to the defense or, at a minimum, reviewed by the judge privately, citing “irregularities” in the grand jury that resulted in his indictment.“There is substantial evidence of grand-jury irregularities in this case,” Lemon’s team wrote in a recent filing.“Multiple judges, including at the Eighth Circuit, found there was no probable cause to charge Lemon” and his co-defendant Georgia Fort, the filing said.Mark Wolf, a former Massachusetts District Court judge and federal prosecutor, said it is rare for defense attorneys to ask for grand jury transcripts in federal court. It is even more rare that judges grant the motions, he said.“There is a high bar to getting grand jury materials,” Wolf said. “You have to have some direct or circumstantial evidence that there has been some defect in the grand jury proceeding.”In her two-page order, Provinzino wrote that she weighed the necessity of maintaining grand jury secrecy against whether grounds may exist to dismiss the case due to a “matter that occurred before the grand jury.”She did not say she had already found evidence of any misconduct.The Justice Department’s initial attempt to charge Lemon in January for appearing alongside protestors who disrupted a church service in St. Paul, Minnesota, was rejected by a federal magistrate judge, which “enraged” then Attorney General Pam Bondi, according to a source who spoke to CNN at the time.Lemon, a former CNN anchor, was later indicted by a grand jury along with several other defendants, including independent journalist Georgia Fort. Lemon has been charged with conspiring to violate someone’s constitutional rights and violating the FACE Act, which prohibits the use of force or threats to intentionally interfere with someone expressing their First Amendment right to practice religion.Lemon has pleaded not guilty to both charges. His team has aggressively pursued obtaining grand jury materials throughout the case, and earlier this month filed a motion to dismiss the case altogether.Justice Department losing credibilityWolf told CNN he does not believe the Justice Department’s credibility remains intact.“For good reasons, the Department of Justice’s reputation with judges generally has been injured,” Wolf said.In Chicago, defense attorneys urged Judge April Perry to release grand jury transcripts in the highly publicized case against protestors at an ICE detention facility outside the city.After reviewing those transcripts, Perry found federal prosecutors engaged in inappropriate actions, such as interacting with grand jurors outside the proceeding, ordering some jurors to leave in another hearing, and “vouching” to the grand jurors.Vouching is a practice where prosecutors present their own reputation while delivering their case to a grand jury. It is forbidden in grand jury proceedings because the practice effectively asks jurors to trust the prosecutor personally rather than only on the merits of evidence.“I have never seen the types of prosecutorial behavior before a grand jury that I saw in those transcripts,” Judge Perry said during a May 21 hearing.US Attorney Andrew Boutros then dropped the case against the protestors. Later, after reviewing the prosecutor’s conduct, Boutros opted to drop at least two more criminal cases, ordered a historical review of more than 100 grand jury transcripts, and launched reforms such as more training on grand jury presentations.“If I was a federal public defender or a private defense attorney, every case I get that’s indicted, I’m going to file a motion that is asking the judge to review the transcripts,” said Mike Fox, a current Cato Institute fellow and former Colorado public defender.“In my view, at this point, it doesn’t matter in which court it is, doesn’t matter if I have binding case law,” Fox said. “Every single case, the defense attorney should be filing, and the judge should be inquiring.”In May, a panel of three federal judges in Wyoming dismissed felony drug and gun indictments against nine defendants after the judges found the acting Wyoming US Attorney referred to defendants as “bad guys,” and “murderers,” and handed out business cards to jurors outside of the proceeding.Prosecutors opted not to appeal the judges’ order. Later, Wyoming federal prosecutors empaneled a new grand jury which issued a new indictment. The case remains ongoing.Fox believes the remedy is a more engaged judiciary where judges routinely witness grand jury proceedings.The current law doesn’t require judges to listen to proceedings, but some courts are issuing new local rules to ensure greater oversight. This spring, the Northern District of Illinois, where Boutros is US Attorney, enacted a rule requiring grand juries to alert a magistrate judge when a grand jury fails to issue an indictment.A spokesperson for the Justice Department told CNN in an email the executive office of the US Attorney provides training for prosecutors which includes grand jury practice.“On rare occasions where there is an issue, as noted in our Chicago US Attorney’s office, we took immediate corrective action and provided renewed, in-depth instruction on ethics and grand jury practice,” the spokesperson wrote.“Our US Attorneys will always follow the law and prosecute cases without fear or favor. Nobody is above the law, regardless of political affiliation. Beyond that, we don’t comment on pending litigation.”Grand jury presentments in the spotlight last yearLast fall, in the most high-profile and politically charged example of a problematic grand jury presentment, then-interim US Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, Lindsey Halligan, took a proposed indictment against former FBI Director James Comey through a grand jury on her own. A magistrate judge in Alexandria, Virginia, reviewed the transcript and found Halligan may have incorrectly presented the law to the grand jury. The judge called the debacle “profound investigative missteps … to potentially undermine the integrity of the grand jury proceeding.”Halligan later admitted to a judge the grand jury hadn’t supported the initial version of the proposed indictment of Comey, and the full grand jury hadn’t signed off on the final charging document. That Comey case was dismissed for a separate reason, when a federal district judge determined Halligan wasn’t serving as a legitimate prosecutor. The Justice Department is appealing.But the grand jury handling in the Comey case and other cases continues to hover over prosecutors.Comey’s defense team, for instance, is attempting to pry into grand jury records in the separate, newer case against him, out of Eastern North Carolina. He is charged there with threatening the president by posting on social media a photo of the numbers “8647” written in seashells on a beach.The phrase 86 is sometimes used to say nix or get rid of something. Trump is the 47th president. Comey has denied wrongdoing in the case.“The highly irregular procedures that led to the indictment create a significant risk that the government misrepresented key issues of fact and law to the grand jury,” Comey’s lawyers wrote in a recent court filing, citing federal searches of Comey that they question.If Comey’s defense cannot gain access to the grand jury transcript, they at least want a judge to look at it to check the Justice Department’s work.Wolf said he is deeply troubled by the Justice Department’s recent actions and told CNN he believes it shows the American people that the department will use the law for partisan purposes.“It sends a message that a Department of Justice that should institutionalize our ideal of equal justice under law is not doing that,” Wolf said. “And that means anybody is vulnerable.”The-CNN-Wire™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.
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