Judge rules Democrats can only have limited access to Trump’s financial records

WASHINGTON – A federal judge in Washington on Wednesday awarded a House committee a partial victory in its long-standing efforts to obtain financial records from Donald Trump’s accounting firm.

But the decision also gave the former president some ground by limiting the nature and scope of the documents sought.

U.S. District Court Judge Amit Mehta said the House Oversight and Reform Committee may issue a subpoena to obtain documents from Mazars, the accounting firm, to examine the nature of Trump’s federal hotel lease in Washington. The committee can also obtain financial records to determine whether Trump’s income from overseas properties violated the Constitution’s ban on foreign emoluments.

But the judge said the committee had not demonstrated a specific need for documents related to Trump’s financial disclosure obligations. The committee “does not adequately explain why other sources of information – other than President Trump’s personal papers – could not reasonably provide Congress with the information it needs.”

Representative Carolyn Maloney, chair of the oversight committee, said she was delighted that the ruling “declares the committee entitled to eight years of financial information from Mazars regarding President Trump, the Trump Organization and the Trump Old Post Office Hotel, as well as a larger body of information on the first two years of Mr. Trump’s presidency.

“While it is disappointing that the Court, despite finding that the entire subpoena was used for valid legislative purposes, reduced the subpoena in some respects, the Committee is actively considering the next steps.”

The legal battle over the documents began in 2019 and ended in the Supreme Court, which rejected Trump’s argument that a president’s files were beyond the reach of Congress. But that ruling last year said lower courts must respect separation of powers issues by requiring documents from a president.

The oversight committee issued a revised subpoena in February, offering new rationale for Trump’s accounting firm records.

Mehta said a congressional subpoena for a former president’s records need not meet as high a legal standard as one would apply to someone still in office. The current document request “only searches for President Trump’s personal files, so it places no burden on the sitting president.”

Even so, Mehta said, a former president deserves a certain deference that wouldn’t apply to an ordinary citizen, and the judge reduced the committee’s request for documents related to Trump’s income from foreign property. The summons requested financial documents from 2011, but Trump did not become president until 2017 and could not have received constitutionally prohibited emoluments before that date. So the judge said the subpoena could only search those files from Trump’s appointment as president.

The House Oversight Committee originally acted after former Trump attorney Michael Cohen testified that “Mr. Trump inflated his total assets when he served his goals and deflated his assets to reduce his property taxes”.

Personal attorneys for the president have argued that Congress only has the power to issue subpoenas for the purpose of drafting laws. Trump’s document requests, they said, were more of an effort to investigate, not to legislate. Simply claiming that the information could lead to changes to existing laws could not turn a law enforcement effort into a legislative effort, they said.

Trump’s lawyers have not said whether they will appeal Wednesday’s ruling, but given their constant objections in the past, such a move could be likely.