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Trump’s Tax Returns, or What Does Nancy Pelosi Have to Hide?
Watching the election coverage last night it had barely become clear that the Democrats were going to take the House before all the talk (on the “mainstream” channels I was surfing) turned to salivating over the ability of House committees to use the subpoena power to get Trump’s tax returns. It was almost indecent. The masks slipped pretty fast. They weren’t attached very well to begin with.
But I’m not 100 percent sure how these tax return subpoenas are going to shake out. I’m familiar with the subpoena power in private litigation. As a lawyer for several decades, I’ve issued plenty of subpoenas. But subpoenas aren’t magic. You don’t necessarily get what you want. They’re just formal requests that obligate the recipient to either a) comply, b) negotiate some acceptable alternative, or c) let a court decide whether compliance is required (a recipient can move to quash or an issuer can move to compel enforcement). In practice, subpoenas are rarely complied with as issued.
Would be curious to hear from someone with expertise on the question of the scope of Congress’s subpoena power. Obviously a congressional committee isn’t a private litigant or even a prosecutor. The scope of its power and discretion in seeking information is going to be different. But is it unlimited? I’m not sure “we’re just looking for something politically damaging” is going to be enough for a subpoena to stand up to judicial scrutiny.
And God help us if it is. Maybe a Senate committee can start launching random subpoenas to Schumer and Pelosi. I’m sure they’ve got some skeletons. Pelosi and her husband have made a fortune. Is that really all on the up and up? Or have there maybe been some fat contracts steered Mr. Pelosi’s way? Foreign financing on some business endeavor? Enquiring minds want to know. I’m not saying there’s anything there. Maybe there’s not. Probably there’s not. But if the subpoena power is an unconstrained political tool, what’s to stop the Republican Senate from checking?
In case you can’t tell, I don’t like where this is going. In truth, I don’t want Nancy Pelosi and her husband pointlessly harassed. Or any other member of Congress for that matter. Or Trump. Washington is enough of an embarrassing circus already. If the House or Senate is going to investigate the behavior of political leaders, there out to be some evidence of a crime (or maybe an ethics violation for investigations within a legislative body) as a basis and a justification for turning its sights on an individual actor. The death knell for a privately issued subpoena is the conclusion that it’s nothing more than a “fishing expedition” and the same rule should hold for Congress. I look forward to watching how the subpoenas for Trump’s tax returns play out. My guess is there will be much litigation, and it is not at all clear to me the Democrats will (or should) prevail.
Published in Politics
One potential hook for a subpoena, Schiff has been on TV (shades of Harry Reid) claiming Russians are laundering money through the Trump Organization.
Aside from that, I’d expect Trump to tell Congress to take a flying leap. Remember, Nixon fought the tapes case all the way to the Supreme Court. Yes, not a perfect analogy, but it shows it takes time for these things to play out.
Ultimately it’s up to Congress to enforce its own subpoenas. Usually, almost always, Congress shys away from Global Thermonuclear War. Why? Because it’s like playing checkers.
I can’t see that even their contempt of congress’s had any effect. Eric Holder certainly ignored his.
Some men are born believing they should be women and some women are born believing that they should be men.
I can accept that, but what is mysterious to me is that legislators can believe they are judiciary (and vice versa) and Presidents believe that they are legislators, and whatever perverse other combination one might imagine is probably also happening.
I loathe the idea that free born Americans can be ‘called by Congress’, that Presidents can create groups that act as lawmakers, and that judges believe that their job is to ameliorate laws they believe are wrong.
What is the point of three distinct branches of government if we can’t tell them apart enough to hold them accountable?
Think I remember that Trump organization declared a significant loss at some point which gave them significant tax breaks in successive years. I remember thinking when Southern District of New York said they were looking into Trump corporation that they probably would go for his tax returns. If they could allege something irregular that prosecutors along the aggressive lines of Mueller would run with, they could pretty much cripple him financially if he were to have to pay significant portions of that back with penalty(ies).
It’s not any exaggeration or conspiracy theorizing to say that these people want to crush Donald Trump so badly no non-Leftists, GOP or otherwise, will dare oppose them and expect to win, much less refuse to be intimidated by their PC group think and proceed to actually govern in ways they do not approve. It’s obvious the Kavanaugh confirmation helped lose Dems some Senate seats, yet the expected chair of House Judiciary Committee, Nadler, was heard post-midterm election talking on his cell phone about plans to investigate/impeach Kavanaugh and go all in on Russia/POTUS.
Isn’t that the IRS’s job, not the local DA (or Congress?)
Thanks for the explanation!
Whenever I hear about the House impeaching this or that…Trump or Kavanaugh…a voice inside me says, “How dey gonna do dat?” First of all they only have a slim majority. Assuming it only takes a simple majority of House members to advance any Articles of Impeachment and they are successful in doing such, well, what about the Senate? Nobody talks about the fact that 60 Senators must convict. That will never happen. So the House can issue subpoenas and Trump can ignore them and the House can impeach, and so what? The Senate will never convict.
I gotta ask. Why would any businessman, no matter how successful, ever want to be POTUS? The slimy snakes that we call politicians definitely want to poison the water. Don’t anyone think they can come to D.C. and run things differently. The critters will try to eat you alive.
It’s 2/3, or 67.
There was one UK article where the writer swore there were a bunch of Republican Senators who would vote to convict, but I find that highly improbable. I believe his source was John McCain, a proven Trump hater.
Only Nixon would have come close, if not actually convicted.
And the IRS will be eager to comply. I am surprised they haven’t somehow leaked things before now. Maybe that means there isn’t much there?
Correct, it is 2/3 or 67 Senators. And the ranks of the newly reinforced Republican controlled Senate have been purged of most of the NeverTrump groupies.
More likely the returns are so large and complex, it would take an army of accountants an infinite number of years to audit them.
Convicted? The terms are “impeached” and “removed from office”.
Well, that’s not totally accurate. There is also “unproved”, reserved solely for aficionados of Scottish Law.
Yes. But the press and anti-Trump sense a weakness in his not wanting to disclose Trump organization tax returns, and hope to find some Russian business dealings so they can then cry “collusion”. The fact that he’s done business with Russia will be enough for some people who consider him the worst thing ever to hit the GOP or government in general.
We’re in new territory with Donald Trump in several ways. His wealth for one. No other individual with his level of income/business complexity would want their finances under a microscope for multiple reasons, but that doesn’t seem to be a factor in the thinking of those who want him gone outside being voted out.
As to whether it can be done, consider Manafort, who had been thoroughly reviewed by methods granted to the IRS, and the aggressive irregularities in warrants granted to and search/seizure conducted by Mueller. There’s no evidence in Trump of what brought down Manafort, but the Democrat House will do their best to at least allege there is to get enough legal leverage to go searching a la Mueller methods. There’s already some precedent: Mueller showed up to Trump campaign HQ (bldg they were granted use by the GSA) and seized records/electronics from employees when the GSA director who had granted the campaign privacy died. My reading on the subject indicates even without the written agreement Trump campaign had with GSA, there’s always been an understanding campaign documents are private.
I don’t think you can entirely rule out a conviction. Who knows, maybe there’s a serious crime yet to be uncovered? I think there are plenty of republican senators who would be prepared to abandon Trump if the cause, both factual and political, was sufficient. I just don’t think we have any reason to believe that will be the case.
All the easier to cherry pick something out of context and make political hay out of it.
I have to believe that if Trump had committed a serious crime he would not have run for President. However he could most definitely have done something that people invested in hating him would construe as a serious crime.
I’ll just let the evidence, if any, speak for itself. There’s isn’t much that would surprise me.
Never thought I’d say this about federal justice, but I no longer take the government’s “evidence” at face value. Too many people are too desperate to put together something they think will get them further into the Trump organization’s business…far enough to bring down a chief executive a good portion of heavily Left government agencies don’t mind going after. There are too many overly aggressive prosecutors who withhold exculpatory material to get warrants (not ordinarily given to regular law enforcement), threaten those near and dear to witnesses to get confessions, conduct mafia/drug kingpin style search/seizure raids, etc.
New York Attorneys General don’t even try to hide how bad they want to get Trump, and confirmed US attorney in Southern District New York was ordered to stand down for a guy who couldn’t get to the microphone fast enough to tell the public he was investigating Trump (without naming Trump).
I’d believe a prosecutor like Andrew McCarthy, but there’s not an “Andy” among any of the people I’ve seen/read about in the investigations surrounding Trump so far.
The evidence I’d like to see most right now is those documents Rosenstein has fought to keep redacted.
We’ll see them eventually. I’m patient. What irks me, and I think in large part motivates support for Trump, is that recent history demonstrates bad actors pay no price for their malfeasance.
My theory, by the way, is what’s being covered up isn’t some evil conspiracy. It’s that our allies and our intelligence apparatus were snookered, played by a con so weak a child could see through it. But they wanted to believe.
When Jesse Ventura interviewed Trump back in 2015, right before the Clintons asked him to consider running, he talked about all the interactions he had with his slew of attorneys prior to 2015. Anything and everything to do with his being elected and how to stay elected. For instance, he chose to run as a Republican because he knew he could finesse the nomination process of that party. He also was told by attorneys he would never make it through the set up of “Super delegates” that the Dems use to leave them the Chosen One as the only nominee possible. (Information Bernie Sanders should have considered as well.)
I would be very surprised if the attorneys didn’t also investigate what tax questions might come up as a barrier to his getting the Oval Office or his keeping his place in the Oval Office, once he attained it.
I seem to recall that they often store their files in Hillary’s room.