Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley accused Democrats of Nixonianism Thursday for seeking to use congressional authority to obtain President Trump’s tax returns.
“When you strip out all their pretexts, and when you strip out their circular logic, all you have are Democrats who want to go after the president any way they can,” the Iowa Republican said in a speech on the Senate floor. “They dislike him with a passion, and they want his tax returns to destroy him. That’s all that this whole process is about, and it’s Nixonian to the core.”
Grassley argued that Democrats have no legitimate legislative purpose for seeking Trump’s tax information, as they said was the purpose for the request.
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal, D-Mass., formally requested six years’ of Trump’s tax returns Wednesday, saying that the panel “has a responsibility to conduct oversight of our voluntary Federal tax system and determine how Americans — including those elected to our highest office — are complying with those laws.” By law, Neal has the authority to obtain individuals’ tax information.
[Related: Pelosi: No ‘walking away’ from getting Trump tax returns, Mueller report]
Prior to Trump, presidents since Richard Nixon generally had voluntarily made their tax returns public. Nixon released his tax information after a controversy over his personal taxes and distrust of his oversight of the IRS.
Although Grassley used the term “Nixonian” Thursday, he has criticized Democrats for using it in the past. When Democrats called Trump Nixonian for firing FBI director James Comey in 2017, Grassley told them “to suck it up and move on.”
