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Supreme Court Signs Off on House Obtaining Trump’s Tax Returns

Posted on Nov. 23, 2022

The Supreme Court has rejected former President Trump’s last-ditch effort to block Treasury from releasing six years of his personal and business tax returns to the House Ways and Means Committee.

In a November 22 order, Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. ended a three-year, seven-month legal battle between Trump and the House taxwriting committee with a denial of the former president’s application for a stay of the D.C. Circuit’s mandate. The order came without comment or dissent from any justice.

Trump had sought the Court’s intervention October 31 after the D.C. Circuit rejected his motion for rehearing en banc, in which he claimed that the court erred in determining that the burden placed on a sitting president by the release of his tax returns wasn’t substantial enough to violate the separation of powers doctrine.

The D.C. Circuit held in August that the Ways and Means Committee’s request for the returns served a proper legislative purpose.

While this order only halts the stay, it signals the end of the legal battle because the committee obtaining the returns moots the former president’s lawsuit, which was stated in Trump’s application to the court.

Committee Democrats praised the Supreme Court’s decision.

“We knew the strength of our case, we stayed the course, followed the advice of counsel, and finally, our case has been affirmed by the highest court in the land," Ways and Means Committee Chair Richard E. Neal, D-Mass., said in a release. "This rises above politics, and the Committee will now conduct the oversight that we’ve sought for the last three and a half years.”

“For 1,329 days, our request made under law has been delayed, obfuscated, and blocked by Donald Trump and his adjutants in the government and the courts. Our right to receive these documents is under a century-long statute and our wide Article I legislative and oversight power,“ Ways and Means Oversight Subcommittee Chair Bill Pascrell Jr., D-N.J., said in a release. “At long last the charade should today be over and we should get these documents transmitted to the desk of our committee chairman as soon as possible.”

An Ongoing Battle

The House’s battle for Trump’s tax returns began in April 2019 when Neal requested them but then-Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin refused to comply.

A new request was filed in June 2021, stating that the Ways and Means Committee was considering legislative proposals regarding tax laws and wanted to review the effectiveness of the presidential audit program. With a new secretary in Janet Yellen, Treasury said it would comply with the request.

Trump filed cross-claims in August 2021 against the request, arguing that separation of powers still applied after his presidency and that Congress sought the returns for political reasons. Judge Trevor N. McFadden of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia dismissed the cross-claims and counterclaims in December 2021. Trump appealed, and arguments were heard in March. The D.C. Circuit affirmed McFadden’s decision August 9.

After the D.C. Circuit denied a motion for rehearing, Trump filed an emergency application for stay of mandate pending the filing and disposition of a petition for writ of certiorari. The Supreme Court granted a temporary stay November 1.

Roberts vacated the temporary stay along with his rejection of Trump’s request.

In Trump v. Committee on Ways and Means, Sup. Ct. Dkt. No. 22A362 (2022), Trump is represented by attorneys from Consovoy McCarthy PLLC.

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