| | | How the release of Trump’s taxes blows up a big GOP myth
December 21, 2022 at 2:54 p.m. EST
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal (D-Mass.), center, talks to the media after the committee voted to release Donald Trump's tax returns during a hearing on Capitol Hill on Tuesday. Also pictured are, from left, Democratic Reps. Steven Horsford (Nev.), Judy Chu (Calif.), Mike Thompson (Calif.) and Del. Stacey Plaskett (D-Virgin Islands). (J. Scott Applewhite/AP)
When the House Ways and Means Committee voted on Tuesday to release Donald Trump’s recent tax returns, one thing became clear: A major GOP claim about the quest for these returns has been exposed as bogus. The release of summary data also highlights a deeper argument between the parties about the legitimacy of congressional oversight, and even the functioning of government.
For years, Republicans insisted the Democratic demand for Trump’s returns — which started when he was president and continued after voters sent him back to his Mar-a-Lago estate — was nothing but a fishing expedition. When the Supreme Court ruled that Democrats on the House Ways and Means Committee could access them, GOP outrage grew even louder.
But now that the committee has voted to release them, the big news isn’t just what will be found in the full returns when they are released. It’s also that longtime Democratic assertions about the need to access them have been vindicated. |
|
