It’ll be a while before Americans learn who, exactly, will get checks from the Trump administration’s $1.7 billion fund, but JD Vance pointed to someone specific whom he sees as worthy of a taxpayer-financed check.
“Tina Peters is this woman who is about to get out of prison, thanks in large part to [Donald Trump’s] good work in Colorado,” the vice president told reporters at a White House briefing. “This is a woman who, at worst, if you believe everything that the prosecutor said about her, committed misdemeanor trespassing and somebody threw the book at her.”
Vance went on to say Peters was “innocent,” before concluding, “Is it reasonable for her to get some compensation for the fact that she was treated unfairly? I think the answer is yes.”
At the outset, it’s important to emphasize the vice president’s claims are spectacularly wrong. For example, Peters didn’t just commit a misdemeanor; she was charged and convicted of several felonies.
What’s more, the Ohio Republican might choose to believe Peters was “innocent,” but when she had her day in court, she and her attorney struggled to present much of a defense, and a jury found her guilty.
But to fully appreciate the inanity of Vance’s pitch, we have to dig deeper. To hear the vice president tell it, Peters is entitled to “some compensation” from a so-called anti-weaponization fund (condemned by critics as a “slush fund”) because of the way she was treated during the Biden administration.
What the vice president either didn’t know or didn’t acknowledge, however, was that the Biden administration had literally nothing to do with Peters’ case: The Coloradan faced state charges, in a state court. Her indictment was brought by a state prosecutor (who, incidentally, is a Republican). She was sentenced by a state judge and sent to a state prison. Her sentence was ultimately commuted by her state’s governor (who, incidentally, is a Democrat).
That Peters would get a check from the federal government, from a fund ostensibly created to address federal abuses, reinforces rather obvious concerns that this fund has nothing to do with righting wrongs and everything to do with sending taxpayer money to Trump’s favorite criminals.
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