One thing’s for sure, we ain’t seen nothing yet, but we’ll take what we can get!
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The statute cannot be taken by itself. I wrote a quick explanation yesterday:
[When] construing the content and constitutionality of a statute the courts do not always restrict themselves to its plain meaning.
If you look at the history and construction of law related to federal agencies, you will find that the courts expect to see a “legitimate legislative purpose” behind any request for confidential information, including tax returns.
If you doubt this, ask any of the commenters here who insisted that the Democrats could not have issued their request earlier because they had to “lay the ground” with “bullet-proof” legal justification. (You won’t have to look far to find someone making this argument.)
[If the fact that the statute says] “shall” really is dispositive, why did it take months to ask for the returns?
Apart from that bit of forensic fun, here are two actual cases you can look at to see what courts have done: McGrain v. Daugherty (1927); and Watkins v. United States (1957) (“an investigation into individual affairs is invalid if unrelated to any legislative purpose”).
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AKA “Throwing stuff against the wall and seeing what sticks.”
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Mnuchin’s picture is next to the work “contempt” in the dictionary.
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The remarks came just as Trump personal attorney William Consovoy sent a second letter to Treasury Department general counsel Brent McIntosh, saying that Congress has “no constitutional authority to act like a junior-varsity IRS.”
No he didn’t…
That flippant remark tell you what they think is in store for Mnuchin and the IRS Commissioner…
GOOJF…
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Dude…his sister just resigned from the Federal Court instead of answering questions about a decades long family tax scam. One that Trump and his companies are clearly involved in, and have been for a very, very long time.
The Oversight and Legislative requirement is pretty clear on just that point. But there are countless others.
Keep in mind, this is not just about his own personal tax returns. Trump Org’s returns are also part of the request, though the media has largely ignored that from day one.
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It’s a separation of powers issue because Congress has the legal authority to request anyone’s tax returns to further Congressional investigations. Just as the Constitution gives certain powers to the Executive that cannot be easily challenged. It also gives other powers to Congress in an attempt to create parity. This is the basis of separation of powers.
Thus, if Congress wants to know if Trump is a corrupt a–hole financially and economically beholden to foreign elements, Congress as the absolute right to review Trump’s taxes in camera. It makes no difference as to whether or not it is is current taxes or taxes from 20 years ago because taxes filed many years ago give insight into current holdings, especially when talking about long-lived real estate purchases and financing transactions.
Treasury has to comply otherwise Congress would need its own arm to “execute” Congressional demands. Countless Supreme Court precedents say so.
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Democrats need to Stop dragging this out, serve the Subpoena and start the court actions, let’s get this moving. Democrats inaction will come back on them if they aren’t showing every single day that they are bringing Trump and his administration to account. Get the public hearings going.
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At this point, you really have to wonder what is in his returns that’s so clearly, unambiguously damning. I mean, it must have taken the better part of a weekend and the collaboration of several junior-varsity minds to come up with that “junior varsity” jab. Why the desperation?
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Subpoena? Why not an arrest warrant? The Treasury Secretary and IRS commissioner are violating a very clear and unmistakable law for which there are very clear and unmistakable criminal penalties.
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I know it will come as a shock to everyone that the party of treason is being laughably hypocritical on this. They used the same law to get a hold of tax returns to gin up a fake controversy about the IRS under Obama going after conservative organizations over tax exempt status claims.
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So Trump just informs the committee if they intend to pursue such a path he’ll pardon them.
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“Dude,” I addressed a particular question about a particular statute:
Exactly, and not only did they get those tax returns, they made the information public for no legitimate reason.
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My guess is because Trump and Trump Org have been pretty sloppy with how they do their books and their tax returns. David Farenholdt is still on the trail, and there are some extremely problematic inflations/deflations of assets that he has already tracked down.
We also can make this assumption based upon how loose they played with the Trump Foundation. They weren’t just doing illegal stuff, they were doing it stupidly.
And lastly, lets not forget that the entire Trump family is under investigation for tax fraud going back decades.
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Yes, while ignoring any of multiple very real reasons Congress has for seeing his tax returns, as part of your answer.
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This x1000.
They should have made a request for the taxes on Day 1 of the new Congress and had a subpeona ready when they missed the deadline. The Democrats have been taking months on the march to the courts, when this should have been done in weeks.
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Contemptible for sure 
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Well, what else would you expect from a Russian troll?
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The stink of FEAR with this silly belittlement is almost fun to watch. Trump’s silly slur against McCabe’s testimony as a 'Poor Man’s J Edger Hoover" and now Congress is the “Junior-IRS”. Guess we now know were HuckaBeast got her “Too Stupid” crack she loosed yesterday on ‘the shows.’
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