All posts tagged: Lawfare

CFTC’s Innovation Summit had everything: crypto lawfare, ‘fake news,’ hot dogs and a prediction market cage match

CFTC’s Innovation Summit had everything: crypto lawfare, ‘fake news,’ hot dogs and a prediction market cage match

Published by skeptic

At the CFTC inaugural Innovation Advisory Committee meeting, Wall Street veterans and upstarts from prediction markets agreed Washington needs clearer rules. They were rather less united on whether some of the products currently being invented should exist at all. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) convened some of the biggest names in crypto, derivatives and prediction markets on Thursday to discuss the future of American finance. For roughly three hours, the future was blockchain, artificial intelligence, federal pre-emption and regulatory clarity. Then Terry Duffy got the microphone. The chairman and chief executive of CME Group had listened through discussions of crypto, tokenization and AI before arriving at prediction markets — the final 50-minute session on the CFTC’s official agenda, which specifically called for debate over jurisdiction, manipulation, product design and consumer protection. “I’m a little concerned about this and I’m a lot concerned about it,” Duffy said. Comments from CME’s Terry Duffy that led to the exchange below. https://t.co/ST1kQPxeYh pic.twitter.com/qGFsh7REPC — Fairplaygov (@fairplaygov) August 20, 2026 His complaint was that innovation is all very exciting …

SBA, USDA To Combat ‘Regulatory Abuse’ Lawfare Aimed At Farmers And Ranchers

SBA, USDA To Combat ‘Regulatory Abuse’ Lawfare Aimed At Farmers And Ranchers

Published by Jenni Sidey

Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times, The Small Business Administration (SBA) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) have signed a memorandum to counter lawfare targeting rural communities, ranchers, farmers, and small businesses. Ranchers work to evacuate cattle as the Gifford Fire burns nearby in Los Padres National Forest, Calif., on Aug. 4, 2025. AP Photo/Noah Berger Lawfare refers to the strategic use of legal proceedings to hinder targets. The SBA’s agreement with the USDA gives producers a “direct line to report the regulations and rules driving up costs and impacting productivity,” the agency said in a July 2 statement. It also enables the SBA and the USDA to “identify broader patterns of regulatory abuse to advance lasting deregulatory reform.” The USDA will run a centralized portal that will receive lawfare complaints involving federal agencies, which will be shared with the SBA’s Office of the National Ombudsman. Any complaint involving the USDA will be handled by the department, while other complaints will be referred by the SBA to the appropriate agencies. Under the …

Trump administration dropping DOJ’s .8B ‘lawfare’ fund

Trump administration dropping DOJ’s $1.8B ‘lawfare’ fund

Published by Sam Flores

The Trump administration plans to drop the Department of Justice’s $1.8 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund” in the face of legal and political pushback to it, reports said Monday. The fund was created as part of a settlement of President Donald Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service. It is intended to compensate people who were purportedly victims of prosecutorial overreach by the DOJ under the Biden administration. In addition to the DOJ creating the fund, the settlement included an agreement that protected Trump and his family members from any enforcement actions, including audits, related to their tax filings made before the deal was announced. Reports that the fund was being put on ice came after House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., met with Trump at the White House about the fund. “I do think the best way to handle it is if the administration decides to shut it down themselves,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., told reporters on Monday. US President Donald Trump speaks to members of the media on the South Lawn of …

Schumer, Senate Dems plan votes to block Trump’s DOJ ‘lawfare’ fund

Schumer, Senate Dems plan votes to block Trump’s DOJ ‘lawfare’ fund

Published by Sam Flores

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said Monday that Democrats will force Republicans to vote on a controversial “weaponization” legal relief fund pushed by President Donald Trump. The fund aimed at compensating victims of what the administration calls “lawfare” has become a political flashpoint on Capitol Hill, sparking rare Republican criticism of Trump from within his political party. Democrats are now seeking to force Republicans to defend the program or vote to kill it. “This week, Senate Democrats will launch a coordinated effort to kill the slush fund before one cent goes out the door,” Schumer wrote in a “Dear Colleague” letter sent Monday to Senate Democrats. “And no matter what Republicans do, we will force them to vote.” Read more CNBC politics coverage The fund helped grind Senate floor action to a halt last month, when Republicans were trying to use the budget reconciliation process to fund immigration law enforcement agencies within the Department of Homeland Security. Some Republicans told acting Attorney General Todd Blanche in a closed-door meeting that they opposed the fund …

Trump DOJ ‘lawfare’ fund temporarily blocked by judge as suit proceeds

Trump DOJ ‘lawfare’ fund temporarily blocked by judge as suit proceeds

Published by Sam Flores

A federal judge in Virginia on Friday temporarily blocked the Department of Justice from taking any further action to create or disburse money from its so-called Anti-Weaponization Fund as one of three lawsuits challenging it proceeds. Judge Leonie Brinkema said she would hold a hearing on June 12 in U.S. District Court in Alexandria on whether to maintain the injunction against the DOJ’s $1.8 billion fund. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche earlier this month said he was creating that fund as part of a settlement of a $10 billion lawsuit by President Donald Trump against the Internal Revenue Service for the leak of his tax records by an IRS employee. Blanche is Trump’s former criminal defense lawyer. Hours after Brinkema’s order a judge overseeing a lawsuit challenging the fund in Washington, D.C., federal court scheduled a hearing for Wednesday on the request by the advocacy group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington to issue a temporary restraining order that would block the DOJ’s fund from operating as that suit plays out. The fund is …

Congress is best chance to stop Trump ‘lawfare’ fund, attorneys say

Congress is best chance to stop Trump ‘lawfare’ fund, attorneys say

Published by Sam Flores

President Donald Trump speaks to members of the media as he arrives at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland, May 20, 2026. Evelyn Hockstein | Reuters Congress will have the best chance in the courts to block a controversial $1.8 billion “lawfare” compensation fund set up by the Department of Justice to settle a lawsuit by President Donald Trump against the Internal Revenue Service, former federal prosecutors told CNBC on Wednesday. Those attorneys, both now in private practice, said members of Congress have good legal grounds to challenge the use of taxpayer money for the fund, which purportedly will pay people who were unfairly targeted by the DOJ under the Biden administration. Two days after Trump and acting Attorney General Todd Blanche announced the fund’s creation, skeptics from across the political spectrum emerged to figure out next steps to challenge its legality. Challenges could wind their way through the court system for the duration of Trump’s presidency or longer and could wind up before the Supreme Court. Opponents have various avenues for lawsuits that could delay …

Trump sued by Jan. 6 police officers to block DOJ lawfare fund

Trump sued by Jan. 6 police officers to block DOJ lawfare fund

Published by Sam Flores

Two police officers who defended the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6, 2021, riot sued President Donald Trump on Wednesday, seeking to block the new $1.8 billion “lawfare” fund set up by the Department of Justice to compensate Trump allies who claim they were victims of prosecutorial overreach. “In the most brazen act of presidential corruption this century, President Donald J. Trump has created a $1.776 billion taxpayer-funded slush fund to finance the insurrectionists and paramilitary groups that commit violence in his name,” the lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., says. “The fund, styled the ‘Anti-Weaponization Fund,’ is illegal,” the suit alleges. “No statute authorizes its creation, the settlement on which it is premised is a corrupt sham, and its design violates the Constitution and federal law.” The suit came two days after the DOJ said that Trump had agreed to drop a $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service over the leak of his tax information by an IRS employee in exchange for the creation of the new fund. The two …

Republicans Open New Front In Growing Battle Against “Climate Lawfare”

Republicans Open New Front In Growing Battle Against “Climate Lawfare”

Published by Jenni Sidey

Republicans in Congress are taking action to shield U.S. energy producers from “Climate lawfare,” the relentless barrage of frivolous lawsuits orchestrated by radical environmental activists. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) introduced S.4340, a bill that would bar frivolous lawsuits from green activist groups seeking damages, injunctions, or other relief for harms allegedly caused by the end use of energy products. Senators Ted Budd (R- NC), Tom Cotton (R-AR), and Mike Lee (R-UT) are cosponsoring the legislation. The House companion bill, H.R. 8330, was introduced yesterday by Rep. Harriet Hageman (R-WY). The bill would also void any energy penalty law and preempts any states’ attempts to regulate interstate and global emissions. RELEASE: Sens. Cruz, Cotton, Budd, Lee Introduce Bill to Combat Climate Lawfare and Defend American Energy https://t.co/XN4KgDIhE4 pic.twitter.com/Q3jWNb7J7m — Senator Ted Cruz (@SenTedCruz) April 20, 2026 “Radical environmental groups have waged a coordinated campaign to weaponize our judicial system against American energy producers, including many in Texas,” Cruz said in a statement. “They’re using meritless lawsuits to bankrupt our energy industry, kill good paying jobs, and …

Lawfare at Oxford: ‘No student outlet can afford to go against Carter-Ruck’

Lawfare at Oxford: ‘No student outlet can afford to go against Carter-Ruck’

Published by Sam Flores

Wealthy and Westminster-ready student politicians at Oxford are successfully deploying legal threats to silence critical coverage in student media. This is a phenomenon I saw first-hand when running one of the University of Oxford’s newspapers. An attempt to report on electoral misconduct and vote tampering within one major political society resulted in a legal threat within twenty minutes of offering right of reply; reportage of harassment in another political society earned us a lawyer’s letter from their president. No student outlet can afford to go to court against the likes of Carter-Ruck. Nor, most likely, can a student political society, unless someone has parents bankrolling it. It does seem that the students most conspicuously vying for a seat in the Commons, all too often wealthy, male presidents of political societies, are learning where the media’s jugular is. An important precedent was laid down two years ago when an Oxford Union representative had a lavish birthday party quite long after his birthday and shortly before the Union elections. It was ruled in the Union’s internal tribunal …