Trump seeks to prevent Treasury Department from submitting tax returns to Congress

Lawyers for Donald Trump on Wednesday urged a federal judge to prevent the Treasury Department and IRS from submitting his tax returns to the House Ways and Means Committee.

The reason given by the committee for asking for the returns, to examine how the IRS controls presidents, is just a pretext for wanting to look for something embarrassing, lawyers said in a case filed in federal court in Washington, adding that the legal authority invoked by Congress has never been used against a president, former president or elected official.

“While House Democrats offered countless justifications for obtaining the president’s tax returns, no one at the time ever mentioned the desire to know how the IRS audits presidents,” they said. .

The committee chair’s request for Trump’s tax returns “hardly resembled an effort to investigate how the IRS audits presidents. For the most relevant information – namely, how it audits presidents.” , they said.

The Justice Department’s legal counsel’s office said last week that a federal law requires the government to hand in returns. The Democrat-controlled Ways and Means Committee first called for them in 2019 and renewed the request this year, seeking feedback from Trump’s own and some of his companies.

Trump’s lawyers have said Congress has no general power to investigate individual citizens and cannot demand personal and confidential information like a law enforcement organization would.

The committee cited a federal law that requires the Treasury and the IRS to file individual tax returns at the request of one of three congressional tax committees. The Trump administration refused to provide the documents, arguing that Congress had no legitimate legislative objective to research them and simply hoped to find something that would embarrass the president.

In a 2019 opinion, the Office of Legal Counsel agreed and declared Congress’ request invalid. But he turned the tide last week and said the previous finding had failed to give a coordinated branch of government the “respect and deference” it was due.

Trump’s legal team court record on Wednesday asked a federal judge not only to prevent the Treasury from handing over tax returns, but also to order the Ways and Means Committee “to end all reviews ongoing “of Trump and his companies.