That Democrats actually think there might be a point to score in seizing President Trump’s tax returns says everything about how clueless they are heading into 2020.
There is no indication that voters actually care about this (they didn’t in 2016), nor that there’s anything to gain in waving around a piece of paper from the IRS. Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders released 10 years’ worth of tax returns last month, and he’s sitting a comfortable 20 points behind Joe Biden in the latest RealClearPolitics national average.
Remember Rachel Maddow’s massive scoop two years ago — that she had obtained a copy of Trump’s 2005 federal tax return? The tension built and built and built!
Until the climax: Trump had paid a higher effective tax rate than either Bernie Sanders or former President Barack Obama! Scandal!
After the ensuing backlash from her loyal viewers for the letdown, Maddow blamed her them for getting their hopes up. Her show should have been canceled after that.
And remember that painfully long New York Times investigative piece last October? The paper dedicated three of its reporters to spend a year combing through financial records and talking with sources to find that Trump’s father avoided paying a lot of taxes and gave his kids a lot of money.
The Times published a separate “11 Takeaways” story and a “How Times Journalists Uncovered the Original Source of the President’s Wealth” article to accompany the deep investigation. The paper even worked with Showtime for a documentary on the same topic.
Did you even hear about it? The general public reacted to the investigation by hitting the snooze button. NPR reporter Domenico Montanaro acknowledged that the Times piece had “the least impact” because of “the lack of apparent caring or lack of surprise.”
When Republican Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas ran for president in 2016, they released five years’ worth of returns. Trump didn’t, and he ran away with the party’s nomination. In the general election, Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton released her tax returns. Trump didn’t. She lost. He won.
A Morning Consult-Politico poll last month said that just half of registered voters supported Democrats in their attempt to get Trump’s returns. I’m convinced they’re just bitter that Trump has failed to on his campaign promise to make tax filing simpler for average people.
Actually, anyone upset about the annual nightmare that is tax filing can first thank Rep. Richard Neal, D-Mass. He just advanced a bill that would ban the IRS from creating a free filing program. How nice. As head of the Ways and Means Committee, Neal also happens to be the one with authority to demand that the IRS turn over anyone’s tax returns.
He’s been so far rebuffed by Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, but what does Neal think he’s going to find in them anyway? That Trump, a well known BSer, isn’t as rich as he says he is? (By the way, tax returns don’t necessarily give any indication of wealth.) That Trump pays as little in taxes as possible, something everyone does and something Trump has proudly admitted a million times?
Seizing any individual’s private, legally filed tax returns so that you can leak them to the public — which is exactly what Neal would do — is nothing short of abuse of power. It’s a stupid abuse of power, given that tax returns have proven to be a nonfactor, but it’s abuse nonetheless.
Democrats are drowning as we march into 2020, and Trump’s tax returns won’t rescue them.
