Trump’s tax returns are (finally) published in the United States

First modification: 12/31/2022 – 13:02

From RFI’s New York correspondent Loubna Anaki

The documents made public refer to six fiscal years, the period between 2015 and 2020. Remembering, Donald Trump was president from January 20, 2017 to January 20, 2021. Some details had already leaked, but these documents show, for example , that the former president paid just over a million dollars in taxes during his presidency between 2018 and 2019.

The commission’s report included an analysis of the figures from each of Trump’s six tax returns by the Nonpartisan Joint Commission on Taxation (JCT). Among the findings of the JCT, there are relevant contrasts: it paid $750 in 2017, but nothing in 2020. And it is that “nothing at all” that interests the experts.

It shows that the billionaire has declared huge deficits, which contradicts the image of a successful businessman he presents. It was also made public that although Trump had promised to donate all of his presidential salaries to charity, he preferred to keep it all for himself in 2020.

A diary investigation The New York Times it showed that Trump had reported huge net operating losses which allowed him to carry forward and apply to future tax years, greatly reducing or simply eliminating his annual income tax.

For example, the JCT report noted that Trump claimed $105 million in losses for his 2015 tax return, $73 million in 2016, $45 million in 2017, and $23 million in 2018.

Trump, who is preparing for another run for the White House in 2024, had not made his tax returns public, unlike all his predecessors since the 1970s, raising many questions about their content.

But in mid-December, a parliamentary committee voted to release the Republican billionaire’s tax returns.

For three years this group of legislators had been demanding the documents sent by Trump to the Treasury in that period, to which the former president refused. Finally, the Supreme Court ruled in his favor at the end of November.

Trump, 76, strongly denounced this decision in a written statement he sent to CBS on Friday.

“‘Trump’ tax returns show once again how proudly successful I have been and how I have been able to use depreciation and other tax deductions as an incentive to create thousands of jobs and magnificent structures and businesses,” he wrote.

The publication represents a new setback for the former White House tenant, who is already the subject of endless investigations into the management of his files, as well as his financial affairs in New York.

His family business, the trump organizationwas convicted in early December of financial and tax fraud after a trial held in New York in which the former Republican president was not prosecuted.

Trump’s finances have always been of enormous interest to the public, due in part to the lengths to which he has gone to keep them secret and also because of his lavish lifestyle as a real estate mogul before he became president.

Tax returns can show how much you donate to charities, whether you have business abroad or other conflicts of interest, and how your business has been affected by your presidency and the pandemic period.

The Trump family business group was convicted of tax fraud earlier this month, in a case that Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said was “about greed and deceit.”

Trump himself was not charged, but the Trump Organization and another entity were convicted of operating a scheme to defraud and evade taxes by falsifying business records.

Every US president from Richard Nixon to Trump’s predecessor, Barack Obama, has released their full tax returns, except Gerald Ford, who provided a summary of them.

(With AFP)