Top DOJ official deletes post suggesting alternate plan for compensating alleged ‘weaponization’ victims
Acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche testifies during a House Committee on Appropriations, Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies hearing in the Rayburn House Office Building on June 02, 2026 in Washington, DC. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The Justice Department’s number three-ranked official suggested overnight in a since deleted post that the Trump administration would be moving forward with an alternative plan to compensate victims of claimed Biden-era “weaponization.”
The post came just hours after the acting attorney general committed to Congress that DOJ was scrapping plans for a so-called “Anti-Weaponization Fund.”
The fund was created in exchange for Trump agreeing to drop his $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS as well as two civil claims related to the Russia collusion investigation he faced during his first term in office and the 2022 search of his Mar-a-Lago estate.
Stanley Woodward, the associate attorney general who signed off on the president’s controversial settlement, responded approvingly to a suggestion pushed by Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., on X Tuesday that victims of so-called Biden-era “weaponization” could still be compensated through claims under the requests under the Federal Torts Claims Act.
“We’re on it.” Woodward posted at 10:45 p.m. Tuesday evening in response to Graham’s post. Woodward’s post was deleted Wednesday morning, and a DOJ spokesperson has not responded to ABC’s request for comment as to why it’s no longer on his X account.
The post comes just hours after acting AG Todd Blanche told House lawmakers that the administration was permanently scrapping plans for its “Anti-Weaponization Fund.”
Blanche, however, under pressure from Democrats did not commit to putting the department’s position into writing.
Democrats could seek to seize on Woodward’s post as evidence the administration is seeking an alternate way to pay Jan 6 rioters.
(INDIANAPOLIS) — If all politics is local, as the old saying goes, a pair of identical twins in Indiana proves that those local politics often start as a family affair — and don’t have to become uncivil.
Nick and Nathan Roberts may look exactly alike, but the 25-year-old brothers and members of the next generation of America’s civic leaders are anything but identical when it comes to their politics.
“From the time we were younger, he ended up in more right wing circles on the internet,” Nick said of his brother in an interview with ABC News Live PRIME. “I was in more of just more liberal circles. I don’t know what happened.”
They still live together with their grandparents, sharing a love of dogs, books and desire to travel the world. But that’s where the similarities end.
Nick Roberts, a diehard Democrat, is an Indianapolis city-county councilor and one of the youngest elected officials in the country.
Nathan Roberts, who identifies as a MAGA Republican, founded an Indiana political advocacy group last year and is a state organizer for Turning Point, the organization founded by Charlie Kirk.
“Our dad was conservative and our mom was liberal,” Nathan Roberts said. “I guess those are good examples of our family being divided.”
The Roberts twins, both college dropouts, are also Gen Z political outliers. More American twentysomethings identify as independents than any other group of adults, according to Gallup. Roughly one in four identify as Democrats, even fewer as Republicans.
“If you want to make a difference, you have to be involved,” said Nick Roberts. “And it’s easy, I think, to throw your hands up and say, ‘Well, I’m an independent. I hate both parties.’ But if you actually want to be engaged in the process, you have to kind of pick a side.”
“I think a lot of people go independent because it’s kind of like a sign of, like purity, like I’m above the thing,” added Nathan Roberts, “but really, it’s just like you not having much of a voice. I sort of understand and respect what people do when they go independent, I just don’t think it’s the right strategy.”
The twins got engaged in politics as Donald Trump rode down the escalator in Manhattan in 2015, launching his first presidential campaign. In 2020, they participated in their first campaigns and later supported rival candidates for president in 2024.
They say they agree on support for public safety, veterans issues and even protecting the environment. Their sharpest disagreement: immigration.
“I support law enforcement, but there’s come a point where, you know, we are nation immigrants,” said Nick Roberts. “Everybody came from immigrants at one point or another, and we have to do it humanely with laws, but not where we’re treating people inhumanely like we’ve seen over the last few months.”
Nathan Roberts rejects the view of an American “melting pot.”
“‘Nation of immigrants’ — those terms didn’t, none of them even existed until post-1900. You never heard George Washington saying America is a nation of immigrants,” he said.
On 95% of the issues, they sharply disagree and are dug in. When President Trump demanded Indiana redraw its election map to help Republicans in November, the twins even testified against each other in the statehouse.
Still, in what some see as a lesson for the country, the Roberts twins insist they manage never to get angry or unloving with each other.
“He’s very intelligent, and I love the fact he gets involved. You have all these people giving their opinions about stuff on the internet, but none of them lift a finger, besides maybe voting,” Nathan Roberts said of his brother. “He’s somebody who shows up to stuff.”
Nick Roberts said behind the “provocative” rhetoric, Nathan Roberts is reasoned and informed. “Though he pretends to be like a very inflammatory guy on social media,” he said, “I think he is very well-read on history and knows a lot of his stuff and the law, especially immigration.”
With no desire for higher political office for now, the Roberts twins say they’re just content to be councilor and constituent, as brothers, modeling civility and love despite the deepest political differences.
“Believe it or not, he’s actually not one of my most demanding constituents,” Nick Roberts said of Nathan Roberts with a chuckle.
“There’s been a time when I’m like, you know, you could change that, like, traffic sign to be slightly better and there wouldn’t be such a traffic jam at that place at 5pm,” Nathan Roberts quipped with a smile, “and he would be like that would be a good idea.”
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) speaks to members of the media during a news conference on Capitol Hill on March 4, 2026 in Washington, DC. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The House failed to adopt a war powers resolution that attempted to curtail President Donald Trump’s military actions in Iran.
It failed by a vote of 212-219. Republican Reps. Thomas Massie and Warren Davidson bucked GOP leaders by voting in favor; four Democrats voted against the resolution, including Reps. Greg Landsman, Henry Cuellar and Jared Golden.
The resolution, which only expresses the sentiment of Congress, called on the president to terminate the use of U.S. armed forces in hostilities against Iran or any part of the Iranian government or military unless a declaration of war or authorization to use military force is enacted.
The measure was non-binding and not subject to the president’s signature or veto.
Speaker Mike Johnson argued Wednesday that the United States is “not at war” but only engaged in a “defensive operation” in Iran.
“We’re not at war right now,” Johnson told reporters at the Capitol. “We’re in — four days into a very specific, clear mission and operation.”
Later on Wednesday, Trump contradicted Johnson, repeatedly referring to the conflict in Iran as a “war” hours after Johnson said it wasn’t.
Sitting next to Johnson during a roundtable on energy prices, Trump said “we’re doing very well on — on the war front, to put it mildly.”
Johnson had said that the “passage of a war powers resolution right now would be a terrible, dangerous idea.”
“It would empower our enemies. It would kneecap our own forces, and it would take the ability of the U.S. military and the commander in chief away from completing this critical mission to keep everybody safe,” he said Wednesday.
On Wednesday, Senate Democrats failed to meet a 51-vote threshold on an alternate Iran war powers resolution sponsored by Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine and Republican Sen. Rand Paul. The resolution failed behind a 47-53 tally.
US President Donald, left, and Pete Hegseth, US secretary of defense, during a cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, Jan. 29, 2026. (Aaron Schwartz/CNP/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The leader of an Iranian unit behind an attempted 2024 plot to assassinate President Donald Trump has been killed, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told reporters on Wednesday as he gave an update on the administration’s war against Tehran.
“Yesterday, the leader of the unit who attempted to assassinate President Trump has been hunted down and killed,” Hegseth said. “Iran tried to kill President Trump, and President Trump got the last laugh.”
The secretary did not name the individual, and later said the killing was not the objective of the operation.
“We’ve known for a long time that Iran had intentions on trying to kill President Trump and or other U.S. officials,” Hegseth said.
“While that was not the focus of the effort by any stretch of the imagination, in fact, never raised by the president or anybody else, I ensured, and others ensured, that those who were responsible for that were eventually part of the target list,” he added.
In the summer of 2024, when Trump was campaigning for president, U.S. intelligence indicated there was an Iranian threat to assassinate Trump, prompting the Secret Service to increase his security protection.
In November 2024, the Department of Justice charged an Iranian man who prosecutors said was tasked with surveilling and killing Trump to avenge the 2020 death of Qassem Soleimani, the top commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Soleimani was killed in a January 2020 U.S. drone strike in Baghdad directed by Trump.
Iran has denied that it had plotted to kill Trump.
President Trump, in a phone call with ABC News Chief Washington Correspondent Jonathan Karl, mentioned the assassination plot when discussing the U.S. and Israeli strike that killed Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
“I got him before he got me,” Trump told ABC’s Karl on Sunday night. “They tried twice. Well, I got him first.”
Hegseth on Wednesday also announced that the U.S. submarine had sunk an Iranian warship in the Indian Ocean named the “Soleimani,” the first time a U.S. submarine had sunk a ship since World War II.
