Democrats eye Donald Trump’s tax returns but expect a long fight
Getting President Donald Trump‘s tax returns is high on the list of Democratic priorities now that they have won the House. By law, the leaders of tax-writing committees in the House and Senate can obtain tax returns and related information from the Internal Revenue Service. Democrats will control the House panel next year. Yet there’s no guarantee that the Trump administration will provide the president’s returns. That sets up the possibility of a legal battle over the request that could take years to resolve. Trump broke with political tradition in 2016 by refusing to release his income tax filings. He says he won’t release them because he’s under audit, and he claimed at a press conference this week that the filings are too complex for people to understand. The Democrats tried and failed several times to obtain Trump’s returns as the minority party in Congress. Now, having gained some control, they see them within their grasp. Eyes are on Rep. Richard Neal of Massachusetts, who is now the senior Democrat on the powerful Ways and Means Committee and will become its chairman in January. When asked Wednesday whether the committee under his control would ask for the documents, Neal said, “Yes, I think we will.” If the Trump administration refuses and mounts a legal challenge, Neal said, “Then I assume that there would be a court case that would go on for a period of time.” A legal fight could potentially even stretch beyond the 2020 presidential election, suggested Andy Grewal, a professor at the University of Iowa College of Law. Grewal has maintained that a request for Trump’s returns, if made for “purely political purposes,” may exceed the limits of Congress’ authority. Starting with the 2016 campaign, Trump broke with political tradition by repeatedly refusing to release his income tax filings. Those filings are deemed sacredly secret for citizens, but traditionally not for presidents. Trump has said he hasn’t released them because his taxes are under audit by the IRS — even though experts and IRS officials say such audits don’t bar taxpayers from releasing their returns. Asked about releasing his filings, Trump reaffirmed that justification during a post-election news conference Wednesday. “They’re under audit. They have been for a long time,” the president said. “They’re extremely complex. People wouldn’t understand them.” Giving a slight opening, Trump said that if the audit was completed, “I would have an open mind to it. I would say that.” But, he added, “Nobody turns over a return when it’s under audit.” In 2017, more than a million people signed a petition to the White House urging Trump to make the returns public. Questions loom: Was the swaggering longtime businessman and real estate mogul really worth $10 billion when he entered the White House, as he has claimed? Are there conflicts of interest lurking? How has his global panoply of properties and other assets been valued for taxation purposes? What are the sources of his income and to whom might he be beholden as a result? Does Trump stand to gain personally from the sweeping Republican tax law enacted late last year, which he championed, and, if so, how specifically? Among the sought-after details: Trump’s charitable giving, the type of deductions he claimed, how much he earned from his assets and what strategies he deployed to reduce his tax bill. House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi declined during a press conference Wednesday to specifically address the question of Trump’s returns, saying only that Congress has “a constitutional responsibility to have oversight” and citing examples such as the government’s environmental policy that would be ripe for Congress to investigate. The high interest — Democrats would say the urgency — in lifting the veil on Trump’s taxes ramped up last month when The New York Times published an extensive report suggesting that the Trump family cheated the IRS for decades, undervaluing reported assets and using dubious tax maneuvers and outright fraud in some cases. A lawyer for Trump disputed the Times’ findings of possible tax fraud or evasion and said that parts of the report were “extremely inaccurate.” The newspaper said its report was based on more than 100,000 pages of financial documents, including confidential tax returns from Trump’s father and his companies. That could spur the Democrats on the Ways and Means Committee to ask for Trump’s returns going back many years. By law, the chairmen of the House panel, the Senate Finance Committee and the Joint Committee on Taxation can make a written request for any tax returns to the Treasury Secretary, who oversees the IRS. The law says the Treasury chief “shall furnish” the requested information to the members of the committee for them to examine behind closed doors. The IRS, with custody of Trump’s returns, has been headed since Oct. 1 by a commissioner who worked as a private tax attorney for nearly four decades representing individuals and companies in cases before the agency. During the 2016 campaign, the commissioner, Charles Rettig, defended Trump’s refusal to release his filings. He promised at his Senate confirmation hearing to uphold the IRS’ political independence from the White House. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin “will review any request with the Treasury general counsel for legality,” the department said in a statement Thursday. Trump’s attorney Rudy Giuliani has said the Democrats could have a hard time proving their demand was intended for pursuing legitimate congressional oversight, not a political scavenger hunt. If the administration refuses to hand over the returns, the Democrat-led committee might punch back with subpoenas, move to hold officials in contempt of Congress or sue the administration. There’s no roadmap or historical precedent for the situation. Some observers anticipate that the Trump Justice Department would file a lawsuit against the House to block release of the returns. In that case, the administration might try to prove that the Democrats’ demand was politically motivated, as Giuliani indicated. The University of Iowa’s Grewal is among the experts who believe the administration may seek to make
Russia probe revival expected if Democrats win House
House Democrats are expected to reopen the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election if they win the majority in November. But they would have to be selective in what they investigate. California Rep. Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the House intelligence panel, has said his party would have to “ruthlessly prioritize the most important matters first.” The Republican-led Intelligence Committee was the only House panel to investigate Russian meddling, and its investigation is now closed. Republicans say they found no evidence of collusion between Russia and President Donald Trump‘s campaign. Democrats say Republicans ignored key facts and important witnesses and want to restart parts of the investigation if they win the House. But some Democrats also worry that there could be a political cost if they overreach. Schiff and other lawmakers say they are closely watching special counsel Robert Mueller‘s Russia investigation and the Senate’s Russia probe to look for gaps that they could fill. And if Mueller issues any findings, their investigative plans could change. “My sense is that we want to be precise,” says California Rep. Eric Swalwell, a Democratic member of the intelligence panel. Here’s a look at what Democrats are likely to investigate if they take the House majority. ___ MONEY LAUNDERING Schiff has repeatedly said a priority for Democrats would be investigating whether Russians used laundered money for transactions with the Trump Organization. Trump’s businesses have benefited from Russian investment over the years. Schiff said he wants to know whether “this is the leverage that the Russians have” over Trump. Other committees might also want to look into money laundering, including the House Financial Services panel. It’s unclear whether Mueller is probing money laundering related to the president’s business. ___ MORE WITNESSES The Democrats issued a list in March of several dozen people whom the committee hadn’t yet interviewed when the Russia investigation was shut down. Democrats would want to call in some — but probably not all — of those witnesses. Former Trump campaign advisers Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, Rick Gates, and George Papadopoulos are among them. They all pleaded guilty to various charges in the Mueller probe and have cooperated with prosecutors. Important witnesses whose credibility Democrats have questioned might also be called back. That includes Trump’s former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, who pleaded guilty in federal court in August to campaign-finance violations and other charges, and prominent Trump supporter Erik Prince, who met with Russians during the campaign. Prince was defiant in an interview with the intelligence panel in December. “I believe there are those who were less than candid with us,” says Illinois Rep. Mike Quigley, a Democratic member of the committee, referring to Cohen and Prince, among others. Democrats have said they also want additional documents that Republicans refused to subpoena. ___ PUBLIC HEARINGS House Republicans limited their Russia investigation to the intelligence panel, which traditionally conducts most of its business in secret. Democrats would probably spread the investigation over several other committees, opening it up and allowing for public hearings with top Trump officials. Texas Rep. Joaquin Castro, a Democratic member of the intelligence panel, says they would try to be more transparent. The Republican investigation was “a way to keep everything behind closed doors,” he said. Democrats would also push to provide interview transcripts to Mueller, a step Republicans had resisted. The committee recently voted to make most of its Russia transcripts public, but it’s unclear when that will happen. ___ DONALD TRUMP JR. Democrats have pushed for more information about the president’s son, Donald Trump Jr., and communications with his father and other aides related to a June 2016 meeting between Trump campaign officials and a Russian lawyer. According to phone records he provided to Congress, Trump Jr. had a call with a blocked number several days before the meeting took place; he said he didn’t recall with whom. Democrats want to subpoena additional phone records because Trump Jr. has insisted he didn’t alert his father to the meeting beforehand. They also want more information about his communications with former Trump communications aide Hope Hicks. Democrats may also look into direct messages on Twitter between Trump Jr. and WikiLeaks, the website that released emails from top Democratic officials during the 2016 campaign. Trump Jr. has released those direct messages, in which the website urged him to publicize its leaks. ___ TRUMP’S TAXES Democrats in the majority would probably push for the release of Trump’s tax returns, a task that would be up to the House Ways and Means Committee. Trump broke a decades long tradition by declining to release his returns during the campaign. The Republican House and Senate have declined to ask for them. Lawmakers hope that access to Trump’s taxes would reveal information about his financial entanglements with other countries, among other things. But getting them may not be easy. The tax-writing committees in Congress can obtain tax records from the IRS under the law, but it is possible the Trump administration would refuse to hand them over, prompting a court fight. ___ ISSUES RELATED TO COLLUSION Since Republicans closed the Russia investigation earlier this year, Democrats on the intelligence panel have conducted some of their own investigations despite not having subpoena power. They have made some progress in probing Cambridge Analytica, a data analytics firm once employed by the Trump campaign that improperly gained access to data from millions of social media profiles. They have also investigated Republican operative Peter W. Smith, who worked to obtain Democrat Hillary Clinton’s emails from Russian hackers, according to The Wall Street Journal. Smith died shortly after talking to the paper. ___ PROTECTION FOR ROBERT MUELLER A Democratic House would probably try to move legislation to protect special counsel Mueller. Trump has repeatedly criticized Mueller and his investigation, calling it a witch hunt. Prompted by concerns that Trump may try to fire Mueller, the GOP-led Senate Judiciary Committee approved legislation in April that would give any special counsel a 10-day window to seek expedited
Despite Democrats’ opposition, General Fund budget has its day before the House
Taking a strategy from last week’s playbook, Alabama House Democrats began a filibuster as the Special Order Calendar was brought up for discussion. The calendar includes the General Fund budget, which raised the ire of Dems because of its lack of adequate Medicaid funding. The current budget leaves in place an about $100 million shortfall in the Medicaid budget and will obliterate plans announced by Gov. Robert Bentley to institute a Regional Care Organization (RCO) program in the state. Both Bentley and House Speaker Rep. Mike Hubbard (R-Auburn) have signaled that there will likely be a special session called to address the shortfall in Medicaid. According to statements made by Hubbard, Republicans are slow to fully fund the Medicaid program because it puts a strain on all other state agencies. Along with prisons, Medicaid takes up about 62 percent of the state’s budget. “I stand here today because I am concerned about where we are on the Medicaid budget,” said Rep. Juandalynn Givan (D-Birmingham). “Yet again, we will have failed the people who need it the most. We find money here in this state for everything in this state that we need to find it for. I still cannot fathom why we need to have a special session, yet again, to fix a problem here in this state that we should be addressing right now.” Givan noted that more than a million Alabamians receive Medicaid benefits and lawmakers should be looking at ways to raise revenue to fund the program. Rep. William Buskey (D-Mobile) referred to constituent concerns over a “bare-bones budget.” “I don’t think it’s bare bones,” Buskey said. “I think it cuts through the flesh, almost to the marrow.” “I believe healthcare is paramount to everything we do,” said Rep. Darrio Melton (D-Dallas). “Healthcare drives so much of our economic development. Let’s make health care strong.” Democrats stalled for more than two hours, but eventually a vote was taken and the Special Order Calendar was approved.
Robert Bentley stresses major budget cuts will ensue without quick remedy
Gov. Robert Bentley continued his crusade against the Legislature’s current budget Wednesday, issuing an announcement detailing severe cuts to Lee County unless the tax increases he is proposing — or perhaps recent a gambling expansion measure he omitted from mention — are adopted as part of an overall budget approach. “We are facing a tremendous crisis in our General Fund Budget that will impact every Alabama county if not addressed by the Legislature,” Bentley said in a prepared statement Wednesday afternoon. Specifically, the governor’s office said that Lee County — home to the city of Opelika and the college town surrounding Auburn University — would face harsh consequences, including the loss of temporary public assistance from the Department of Human Services for 405 children, layoffs for 15 court system employees, possible closing of the Lee County Armory and the Opelika Trooper Post, one of 13 Alabama state trooper posts. “I am committed to finding new revenue so our state agencies can continue to provide essential services to Alabamians. For decades, we have failed to address the way our non-education state agencies are funded,” Bentley said. “With no one-time money available to support the General Fund and debts that are owed, we have a real crisis on our hands. I encourage the residents of Lee County to let their elected representatives know that these cuts are unacceptable and will hurt the people in in Lee County.” Auburn University at Montgomery recently published a study which bolsters Sen. Del Marsh‘s proposal to allow a lottery and a handful of casinos across the state. The study suggested that such an expansion of gambling could help solve the $250 million state budget shortfall currently projected in during the next fiscal year. An initiative to do so is in the works in the Legislature, where Republican House budget chief Rep. Steve Clouse has joined 23 House Democrats in co-sponsoring an agreement that would call for a constitutional amendment that would make Alabama the 45th state in the nation to adopt some form of state lottery. The effort was the subject of a press conference convened Tuesday by Marsh.
