Trump Asks House to end pursuit of his tax returns

It looks like the long-standing investigation into former President Donald Trump’s tax returns will continue for a while. The former President’s legal team has filed an official motion to end House Ways and Means Committee investigation. They claim that the investigation is being pursued for political reasons by the Democrats in Congress. 

This new filing will bring more debates and legal arguments to the investigation. Even as House Democrats aggressively pursue Trump’s financial dealings and history, this new filing makes it unlikely that the tax returns will make it to Congress any time soon. Besides asking the court to end the ongoing investigation into Trump’s many companies and business ventures, the legal team also wants to recoup their legal expenses. The filing argues that Richard Neal, Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, has made requests that “have always been a transparent effort by one political party to harass an official from the other party because they dislike his politics and speech.” 

The filing also asks the federal court to block the Treasury Department from turning over any tax returns. As of this writing, federal judge Trevor McFadden, who was appointed by Trump to the DC District Court, will be reviewing Trump’s claim. The court has set a three-day hold that prevents the IRS from turning over Trump’s taxes. 

In 2019, the House Ways and Means Committee did not receive the tax returns from the IRS and ended up suing the Treasury Department. At the time the House had made requests to receive six years of Trump’s tax returns. They also sought additional information related to eight of his corporate entities. These included his Bedminster golf club and a trust that held his businesses while he was President. The Justice Department, appointed under the Trump administration, stood by the Treasury Department and ignored the request. Trump is already the subject of another ongoing investigation by the IRS and this most recent filing claims that the IRS investigation is under threat of being influenced by Congress.