World · US Politics
Federal Judge Rules Trump Sought to ‘Manipulate the Judicial Process’ in IRS Case, Recommends Sanctions
A United States federal judge has ruled that President Donald Trump’s lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service was brought in bad faith and amounted to an effort to manipulate the judicial process, and she has recommended sanctions against several of the attorneys involved. In a detailed 56-page opinion issued on Monday, US District Judge Kathleen Williams, who sits in the Southern District of Florida, found that the action had no viable basis in law or fact and was pursued for an improper purpose.
The lawsuit was filed in January 2026 and concerned the unauthorised disclosure of Mr Trump’s tax records, and those of other high-profile individuals, by a government contractor named Charles Littlejohn roughly six years earlier. Littlejohn was charged in 2023, pleaded guilty in 2024, and was sentenced to five years in prison. The president, who was joined as a plaintiff by his two adult sons, reportedly sought around 10 billion dollars in the case.
Rather than defend the suit, the Justice Department struck a settlement in late May 2026 that created an approximately 1.776 billion dollar fund, widely referred to as a 1.8 billion dollar “anti-weaponization” fund, to pay individuals who claimed they had been unfairly targeted by the federal government. The deal also produced a tax amnesty arrangement that sought to bar the IRS from investigating Mr Trump, his family, or his businesses for certain past conduct.
A case with no true opponent
At the heart of Judge Williams’s ruling is a simple problem: the two sides were never genuinely opposed. Because Mr Trump, as president, holds authority over the Justice Department, the Treasury and the IRS, the judge concluded that he was effectively suing an agency under his own control, with the outcome arranged in advance. There was, she found, never any real adverseness, never a genuine case or controversy, and never a serious contest over who would prevail.
In her opinion, the judge was blunt about what she believed the exercise was for.
“This was an attempt to use the Court to provide some legitimacy to an agreement to confer immunity to people and entities affiliated with the President and to earmark billions of dollars from American taxpayers to redress grievances not defined in the law.”
She added that even the size of the fund, at 1.776 billion dollars, suggested a branding exercise rather than any careful calculation of damages, echoing the year of American independence. The Justice Department, she noted, could easily have had the case thrown out because Mr Trump waited too long to file, but chose to settle instead.
The sanctions and referrals
Judge Williams found that the tax amnesty component directly contravened federal law that bars presidents and other executive branch officials from influencing tax audits, and she described the government’s acquiescence as incompatible with the duty of Justice Department and IRS officials to enforce the law. She also found that Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward had prior professional dealings with parties who stood to benefit from the settlement, and should have recused themselves.
What the judge ordered
- Referred one of Mr Trump’s private attorneys, Alejandro Brito, to the Florida Bar for possible disciplinary proceedings.
- Restricted a second Trump attorney, Daniel Epstein, from appearing in the US District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
- Directed that her findings be sent to the bar associations in New York and Washington, D.C., where ethics proceedings are already under way against Todd Blanche and Stanley Woodward.
- Barred the Justice Department, the IRS and Mr Trump from citing the deal as a valid settlement, effectively voiding it.
- Indicated that retired judges who had sought judicial scrutiny of the settlement may be entitled to recover their legal fees.
Attorneys for the former judges described the decision as a resounding victory for the rule of law. The Justice Department did not immediately comment.
The response and what comes next
A spokesman for Mr Trump’s private legal team rejected the criticism, arguing that the IRS had wrongly allowed a politically motivated employee to leak confidential information about the president, his family and his company to media outlets, and said Mr Trump would continue to hold accountable those who harm Americans.
The timing is politically awkward for the administration. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche is scheduled to appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee for his confirmation hearing on Wednesday, and legal observers expect the opinion to feature in that questioning. While the practical effect of the ruling is limited, since the lawsuit was withdrawn months ago and the fund has already been abandoned, the opinion stands as a sharp judicial rebuke.
Beyond the immediate parties, the decision sharpens long-running questions about the boundaries of executive authority, the independence of the Justice Department and the IRS, and the standards of conduct expected of government lawyers in politically charged matters. Further updates will follow as the confirmation hearing proceeds.
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