The taxman and the case of missing checks: the Congressional investigation. The former president has often declared losses for his businesses
L’Donald Trump’s economic empire of which the former president has always boasted the extraordinary successes, he’s lost money in four of the last six years. This, at least, what The Donald told the taxman. For a long time, therefore, he paid no taxes to the federal government. And when he reported earnings, he still paid very small taxes: in 2018 (when he was president), he, for example, paid only one million dollars in taxes compared to 24 million in profits. And the year after, when i earnings dropped to 4.4 million, he paid the tax authorities just 133 thousand euros: less than many doctors, lawyers, managers and professionals of all kinds.
Essentially Trump paid $1.1 million in his first three years as president and he paid no taxes in 2020 as his income started to declineshow the summaries of the tycoon’s tax returns, obtained by the House Supervisory Commission at the end of a long and fierce legal battle that lasted for years.
Trump’s fortunes have changed during his presidency, highlight the data from the report, which includes details on the former president’s tax returns from 2015 to 2020. In the two years before taking the White House, the tycoon had suffered heavy losses. In his first three years as president, he had adjusted gross income (the taxable income, after standard deductions) of $15.8 million.
The details of the report, published by the New York Times, show substantial losses over the six years, particularly in real estate and other businesses.
While awaiting the publication of the complete tax returns of the president-real estate developer, based on what was decided two days ago by the US House of Representatives, with a Democratic majority for a few more days, the summary released yesterday by Congress confirms and formalizes Trump’s allergy for taxes already emerged in a 2018 investigation of New York Times: zero taxes paid in 10 of the previous 15 years.
A very successful entrepreneur who has done nothing but lose money year after year? There have always been skepticism and doubts about Trump’s relationship with the tax authorities and he himself boasted of various cleverness in devising ways (in his opinion legal) to avoid paying taxes. But it was believed that the IRS, the tax agency known for the severity of its controls and the harshness of the sanctions, would have brought out any irregularities. Especially since the IRS is required by law to carry out an audit of the fiscal position of the presidents in office.
And Trump should have been monitored with particular attention given that on various occasions – a memorable confrontation with Hillary Clinton during the 2016 presidential campaign – he had even judged it virtuous not to pay taxes to a government accustomed to wasting taxpayers’ money.
The documents now released by Congress confirm that Trump has continued not to pay taxes even in recent years as denounced four years ago by Timesbut also contain two novelties: The Donald has not paid tribute to the wasteful government even in the years in which he is in governmentand to decide on the use of the money of the taxpayer, it was his.
The other, even more disturbing, concerns one prolonged absence of controls on the tax correctness of the president. For years, the IRS, led until a month ago by Charles Rettig, a Beverly Hills tax attorney appointed by Trump, did not carry out any audits and Congress has discovered that the auditing of tax inspectors began only in 2019, when the Republican president was already almost at the end of his mandate: the investigation was launched on the same day that Parliament asked the IRS for data on the tax position of the tenant of the White House.
Three more years have passed and to this day, the US Revenue has not completed its audit of any of the past six years of Trump’s tax returns. But it seems that already his statements to be published contain evidence of irregularities in reducing the taxable amount with imaginative deductions and making unscrupulous use of the losses reported in previous years.
Trump has always managed to convince his loyalists that he is right. Do the same even now by focusing on the anti-statism of US conservatives. This time, however, he will have to overcome himself by explaining, in addition to his allergy to taxes, how one can be a highly successful entrepreneur by accumulating losses year after year.
December 22, 2022 (change December 22, 2022 | 09:43 am)
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