All the Things Wrong with Trump’s Billion-Dollar Fund
5/21/20261 hr 7 min
Sarah Isgur and David French analyze President Donald Trump’s $1.776 billion “anti-weaponization” fund through the lens of three legal “buckets,” and talk about how federal appropriations work and the Obama-era case that hangs over this legal issue. The two also discuss the Supreme Court’s latest cert grant on a Title IX case, plus the circuit split brewing over the First Amendment and judicial elections. The Agenda: –Court agrees to hear case on the ability of employees to bring certain suits for sex discrimination –Going through the settlement agreement, it’s practically a blank check! –Todd Blanche essentially pardons Trump’s family –‘That’s not how appropriations work.’ –Georgia Supreme Court race finishes strong Show Notes: –Chief Judge William Pryor’s opinion –Anti-Weaponization Fund –Keepseagle v. Vilsack Advisory Opinions is a production of SCOTUSblog and The Dispatch, a digital media company covering politics, policy, and culture from a nonpartisan perspective. Click here to sign up for our new Advisory Opinions newsletter, and click here to access all of The Dispatch’s offerings, including audio versions of all our articles and newsletters. If you’d like to remove all ads from your podcast experience, consider becoming a premium Dispatch member by clicking here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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First 90 secondsSpeaker 10:01
You ready?
David French· Host0:01
I was born ready.
Sarah Isgur· Host0:03
[upbeat music] Welcome to Advisory Opinions. I'm Sarah Isgur, that's David French, and on today's episode, we are digging into the nine-page settlement agreement between the Department of Justice and Donald Trump, uh, and the $1.776 billion that has been withdrawn from the general fund. Say what now? We'll dig into all of the ways in which this could be legal, could have been done, is it legal, everything involved in that. We will also talk about the Supreme Court's latest cert grant in brief, Title IX, does it apply to employees or just students? And the Georgia Supreme Court race finishes out strong, but don't worry because we have cases from the Sixth Circuit and the 11th Circuit, a kind of circuit split brewing about the First Amendment and judicial elections. We'll weigh in on that too. And David, I just have to tell you, I spoke to the judges of the Southern District of New York yesterday, and I got an SDNY tote bag, and it is my new prized possession. So if you ever see me out in the wild, I'm gonna be carrying an SDNY tote bag so proudly, and if you