Democrats could divulge Trump tax details after key meeting next week
Ryan King
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House Democrats are expected to vote on whether to divulge details about former President Donald Trump’s tax returns during a key meeting next week.
Last month, Ways and Means Committee Chairman Rep. Richard Neal (D-MA) won access to Trump’s tax returns, but the financial documents remained shielded by privacy laws. On Tuesday, the committee will hold a private meeting in which Neal wants it to vote on whether to make elements of that document tranche public, Politico Pro reported.
HOUSE DEMOCRATS OBTAIN TRUMP’S FEDERAL TAX RETURNS FROM IRS
Democrats could opt to make the full tax returns available to the public or disclose a more scaled-down summary of findings from Trump’s tax returns, according to the report. Lawmakers were sent a meeting notice Friday, which comes near the eve of the looming Republican takeover of the lower chamber.
The former president had long waged a court battle to keep his tax returns hidden from Democrats on the committee, but that gambit ultimately failed last month when the Supreme Court allowed the House Ways and Means Committee to obtain his federal tax returns from 2015 to 2020.
Trump had repeatedly refused to release his returns to the public, citing an IRS audit.
House Democrats are not the only ones to score his tax data. Last year, prosecutors at the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office got their hands on Trump’s tax return. the Manhattan district attorney has reportedly been mulling possible criminal charges against him for financial fraud and efforts to pay porn star Stormy Daniels hush money during the 2016 election cycle.
Additionally, the New York Times obtained a trove of his tax records and found that he paid no federal income taxes in 11 of the 18 years it examined. In 2017, his tax bill was only $750, according to the news outlet.
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Republicans have criticized their Democratic colleagues for pursuing Trump’s taxes, arguing the move was political. There is a precedent for the committee to release tax returns to the public. Back when the GOP was in charge in 2014, it released information about nonprofit groups during an investigation involving former IRS executive Lois Lerner whose agency was accused of targeting conservative groups, the Wall Street Journal reported.