Donald Trump Tax Report Finally Released by House Ways and Means Committee
Donald Trump has long tried to keep his tax returns a secret, even before becoming president. However, the House Ways and Means Committee has now obtained these Trump tax returns and has released a report on them.
The Democrat-led committee voted on making Trump's tax returns public on Tuesday, and it will include six years' worth of the former president's tax returns, according to CNN. It was approved on a party-line vote, clearing the way for those tax returns to be released to the public within a few days.
The report showed some failure on the part of the presidential audit program, as well as a report from the Joint Committee on Taxation that showed details on the Trump tax returns. This report was released after the Supreme Court allowed the release of these documents to the committee.
Democrats have been trying to get their hands on these documents since they took the House majority in 2019. The documents released to them included Trump's tax returns from 2015 to 2020.
Donald Trump Only Received One Mandatory IRS Audit, Says Report
The IRS is mandated to audit the tax returns of all presidents. However, according to CNBC, only one of the former president's tax returns was audited by the IRS when he was still in office. This audit was his 2016 tax return.
The 2016 audit was also incomplete, as it was not yet finished by the time he left office, as shown by the House Ways and Means Committee report.
READ MORE: Donald Trump Rants Against Supreme Court After Congress Allowed to See His Tax Returns
The IRS also did not audit two Trump-related business entities even though they should have been included in the mandatory examination program. They were supposed to be designated for an audit in five of the six years covered by an investigation. However, during the sixth year, which is 2017, there was no indication that these Trump-related business entities were even designated for audit at all.
The report stated that, at best, the mandatory audit program was dormant during the Trump administration.
Trump Tax Documents Audit Started Only After Democrats Took Control of Congress
Unlike all other presidents, the audit for Trump started very late into his presidency. For his 2016 tax returns, the IRS only started auditing them on April 3, 2019, a few months after Democrats took control of Congress.
The Associated Press reported that the date the audit started was when Congressman Richard Neal (D-Massachusetts), who chairs the House Ways and Means Committee, asked the IRS for the trump tax returns.
The House's nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation also released an accompanying report, which stated that they also found repeated faults with the IRS audit of Trump and his companies.
According to that report, the IRS did not bring in specialists with expertise in assessing the complicated structure of Trump's holdings. They simply assumed that because Trump hired a professional accounting firm, the former president properly reported all his income. However, he never actually did any of that.
The Trump tax returns from 2015 to 2020 will be expected to be released in "only days." However, they still have to undergo significant redactions first.
This article is owned by Latin Post.
Written by: Rick Martin
WATCH: Trump's Tax Returns May Embarrass Former President If Lack Of Wealth Is Exposed Expert Says - MSNBC