Trump allies, Jan. 6 defendants lining up to apply for $1.7 billion fund

Less than a week after the Justice Department announced a $1.776 billion "Anti-Weaponization Fund" to compensate those who allege they were wrongly targeted under the Biden administration, Jan. 6 defendants and allies of President Donald Trump are lining up to seek their share of the unprecedented compensation fund.

Sitting in his car outside a campaign event in Minnesota as he runs for governor, My Pillow CEO and Trump ally Mike Lindell told ABC News he hopes his company employees receive millions from the fund for what he believes is the weaponization of the Biden administration against him for his actions after the 2020 election.

Lindell -- one of the leading proponents of 2020 election fraud claims -- told ABC News that third-party auditors estimate his company and employees lost $400 million for the election-related lawsuits and government investigations that followed the election. While Lindell said he personally does not expect to get any money from the fund, he said he hopes his employees -- who own a stake of My Pillow -- can apply for compensation.

"I was glad to see it might be a faster way to get my employees that all were hurt -- some of them lost everything -- and so I think it's a real good thing for everybody," Lindell said. "When a government goes after and damages people in all these programs ... this is set up to help people in need, but our government did it to them."

The fund was created by the DOJ in exchange for President Trump agreeing to drop his $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS as well as two civil claims for $230 million related to the Russia collusion investigation he faced during his first term in office and the 2022 search of his Mar-a-Lago estate -- prompting House Democrats to blast the arrangement as "collusive litigation to force the American people to put ... money into his pockets, and the pockets of his family and friends."

"All of this is outside of the Constitution," said Rep. Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee. "All of it is outside of congressional spending power, and so it is illegal. It is unconstitutional."

The process for submitting claims to the compensation fund is set to be created in the coming months, with Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche given 30 days under the settlement agreement to create the fund and appoint five commissioners. On Thursday, however, some Senate Republicans -- including some vocal Trump supporters -- lashed out against Blanche behind closed doors, telling him they believed the fund could cost Republicans their Senate majority in November, sources said.

Peter Ticktin, a Florida-based attorney who has worked with hundreds of Jan. 6 defendants, said he believes approximately 400 of his clients will be able to stake a claim with the fund.

"I'm anticipating that the process is to develop some kind of a scale that would be depending on the degrees of severity," said Ticktin, who said many of his clients have lost their jobs, businesses, and reputations because of their association with the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

While the Department of Justice has not established a process for claims, Ticktin said he is advising his clients to fill out a government form used to file administrative tort claims -- called the Standard Form 95 -- then file a lawsuit if the claim has not been approved within six months.

"I think we'll be in a better bargaining position if there's a lawsuit," he said. "We can either accept what they offer to us or we can go ahead with our lawsuit, but if we don't file, then the only option is to take what they give us."

Enrique Tarrio, the former Proud Boys leader who was convicted on seditious conspiracy charges and sentenced in September 2023 to the longest sentence of all of the convicted Jan. 6 rioters before he and all other Jan. 6 defendants were pardoned by Trump, is also eyeing the fund.

"From the outset, our position has remained steadfast: The prosecution and surrounding circumstances of this matter constituted a serious miscarriage of justice," Tarrio's attorney Nayib Hassan told ABC News in a statement.

"When the government establishes the process or mechanism for the review, release, and return of funds to individuals similarly situated, our client intends to pursue all relief and remedies available under the law," Hassan said regarding Tarrio, who himself was not present at the Capitol on Jan. 6.

Others interested in potentially applying for the fund include former Michigan elector Meshawn Maddock, as well as conservative attorney John Eastman, who helped devise the so-called fake elector plot.

Adam Johnson -- known on social media as "The Lectern Guy" for the photo of him in the Capitol carrying Nancy Pelosi's podium during the Jan. 6 attack -- was sentenced to 75 days in prison after pleading guilty to entering and remaining in a restricted building. He said on Wednesday that he is currently writing his complaint to the compensation fund and estimated that he spent at least $255,000 on his case.

"The infamy gained from this photo will be in history books. What they did to me will have a generational effect on my family and their livelihoods," Johnson wrote on X, where his profile photo is the image of him with the podium.

On Wednesday, former Trump administration official Michael Caputo said on social media that he is requesting $2.7 million from the fund. Caputo -- who served as a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services during Trump's first term -- claimed he was targeted by the FBI probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election and in another investigation under the Biden administration.

Some of Trump's political adversaries are also eying the fund. Michael Cohen -- Trump's longtime attorney who turned on the president and testified at his Manhattan criminal hush money trial then later claimed that he felt coerced by prosecutors to testify against Trump -- said this week that he wants a payment from the compensation fund.

"Do you really think Donald Trump is going to want you to have any money?" CNN's Jake Tapper asked Cohen on Thursday.

"Probably not," Cohen said. "But wouldn't that be something if he actually decided to do it?"