Donald Trump said Tuesday that the U.S. Justice Department “probably owes him a lot of money” after the press published a report in which he is seeking hundreds of millions in damages for past investigations into him.

The New York Times reported that lawyers for the Republican tycoon are seeking about $230 million from the department in damages for federal investigations into him before he was elected to a second term.

“This decision will have to go through my office. And it’s very strange that I’m going to make a decision that I’m going to pay myself,” the US president commented to reporters when asked about this publication in the Oval Office. “But he suffered a lot of damage,” he added.

After the end of his first term (2017-2021), Donald Trump became the target of federal investigations in particular for illegal attempts to overturn the result of the November 2020 election, won by Democrat Joe Biden, and because he retained in his possession classified government documents. The investigations were dropped after he was re-elected to the top post last year.

For this, the real estate businessman insisted that the Ministry of Justice “probably owes him a lot of money”. “If I take money from our country, I’m going to do something good with it, I’m going to give it to charity or to the White House,” he quipped.

After returning to the US presidency, the Republican launched a series of attacks against the media and others, alleging that they were against him, securing huge sums of money in some of these cases.

He stated that it “could” be true that his lawyers submitted a request for compensation to the Ministry of Justice, but assured that he “doesn’t even know the amounts” and “doesn’t speak with them”.

A spokesman for Mr. Trump’s legal team did not confirm the Times report, but told AFP that the president “continues to defend himself against all of the Democratic witch-hunts.”

When asked for comment by AFP, the Justice Department declined to comment.

The current second-in-command to Todd Blunts is a former member of President Trump’s personal legal team.