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Donald Trump, a self-proclaimed billionaire, paid just $ 750 in federal income taxes in the year he was elected president of the United States, according to a stunning New York Times investigation that could shake up the presidential election.
“Trump’s taxes show chronic losses and years of tax evasion,” was the headline of the banner on the newspaper’s website on Sunday. The president’s tax returns have long been the holy grail of American political information.
The president “paid $ 750 in federal income taxes the year he won the presidency,” the newspaper reported, adding that “in his first year in the White House, he paid another $ 750.
“He had not paid any income tax in 10 of the previous 15 years, largely because he reported losing much more money than he made.”
In all, the newspaper said, Trump paid no federal income taxes in 11 of the 18 years his reporters examined. Many of his businesses, including his golf courses, report significant financial losses, which have helped reduce his taxes.
The Times also said that the documents it had obtained “comprise information that Trump has disclosed to the IRS, not the findings of an independent financial examination. They report that Trump owns hundreds of millions of dollars in valuable assets, but does not reveal his true wealth. They also do not reveal connections to Russia that have not been previously reported. “
The newspaper said it would not publish the documents to protect its source.
At a press conference at the White House on Sunday, Trump made wild allegations about plots against him and about Biden, with whom he will debate for the first time on Tuesday. Finally, he dismissed the Times report as “totally bogus news.”
He said: “We went through the same stories, you could have asked me the same questions four years ago, I had to litigate this and talk about it.
“Totally fake news, no. I actually paid taxes. And you will see that as soon as my tax returns are under audit, they have been under audit for a long time. the [Internal Revenue Service] they don’t treat me well … they treat me very badly. There are people in the IRS, they treat me very badly. “
The president added: “The New York Times tried, the same, they want to create a little history. They are doing everything they can. That is the least. The stories I read are so false, so false. “
When asked why a billionaire only paid a few hundred dollars in the year he won the presidency, Trump insisted: “First of all, I paid a lot and I also paid a lot of state income taxes. New York State charges a lot and I paid a lot of money in the state. Everything will be revealed. It will come out, but after the audit. “
The revelations threaten to damage Trump’s repeated claim to be a successful businessman, and thus a capable manager of the American economy.
The Times also said it has used “questionable measures” to reduce its tax bill. He faced a possible “over $ 100 million” hit if he lost “a decade-long audit battle with the IRS over the legitimacy of a $ 72.9 million tax refund he claimed and received after declaring huge losses. “.
He promised more stories in the coming weeks, adding: “The tax returns that Trump has long struggled to keep private tell a fundamentally different story than the one he has sold to the American public.”
Trump will face Joe Biden at the polls on November 3. It has long resisted demands from political opponents and the media for decades of tax information to be released. He is the first president since the 1970s to keep his tax returns hidden.
The Times reported on the Trump family’s tax affairs in late 2018 and won a Pulitzer Prize.
“Even declaring losses, he has managed to enjoy a luxurious lifestyle by deducting taxes on what most people would consider personal expenses, including residences, airplanes and $ 70,000 in hairdressing for television,” reported Sunday the Times.
“Ivanka Trump, while working as an employee of the Trump Organization, appears to have received ‘consulting fees’ that also helped reduce the family’s tax bill.”
The newspaper added: “Over the past two decades, Trump has paid about $ 400 million less in combined federal income taxes than a very wealthy person who paid the average for that group each year.”
Alan Garten, a lawyer for the Trump Organization, told the Times that “most, if not all, of the facts appear to be inaccurate.”
He said: “Over the past decade, President Trump has paid tens of millions of dollars in personal taxes to the federal government, including paying millions in personal taxes since he announced his candidacy in 2015.”
The newspaper noted that “personal taxes” appeared to cover other federal taxes, including social security and Medicare.
The report drew instant criticism. Ryan Thomas, spokesman for the progressive advocacy organization Stand Up America, said: “Four years ago, Donald Trump broke decades of precedent when he refused to release his tax returns. In every shift since then, he has tried to protect his financial records from the public, even as congressional and criminal investigators investigate how he profited from the presidency and its decades of fraudulent tax schemes.
“We have demanded Trump’s tax returns for years because the American people deserve to know what they are paying for, and the answer seems to be very little. A man who uses dubious tax schemes to avoid paying taxes or lies to the public about his finances has no place in the Oval Office.
“This is just one more reason why we should vote to evict him.”
