Nothing is Certain But Death And That Donald Trump Won’t Show His Taxes

by Richard Cameron

Donald Trump continues his recalcitrant stance regarding submitting his tax returns,

while at the same time 80 percent of Americans believe that President Trump is obligated to release them. A new poll this week conducted by the Global Strategy Group found that 80 percent of Americans wanted to see Trump’s tax returns.

The sentiment demanding an in depth review of Trump’s taxes remains consistent. A national Quinnipiac University survey conducted in August of 2016 found that:

Among all likely voters surveyed, 74 percent said the businessman should release his tax returns, while 21 percent said they do not think he should. More than six in 10 Republican voters, 62 percent to 31 percent, said they would like to see their party’s nominee do so.

In response to numerous Tax Day protests throughout the country, Trump deflects by dismissing the protests in a Twitter post, as being led by paid activists.  “Someone should look into who paid for the small organised rallies yesterday. The election is over!”

Trump, as is typical, offered no evidence to bolster his claim. “We’re like your taxes. Unpaid,” New York political activist Nick Jack Pappas tweeted in response to the president’s message.

And the National Tax March puts the matter in these terms:

President Trump needs to be straight with the American people. To whom does he owe favors? Who are his policies really intended to benefit? Who will he put first? Working families are struggling to make ends meet, but we pay our fair share in taxes – does Donald Trump pay any at all?

There cannot be a serious discussion about what a tax reform bill should include until we know the specifics about Donald Trump’s tax returns. Wes Shockley, an organizer of the New York City march, told NBC News.

“We need to see Trump’s tax returns as a matter of transparency. If we’re going into a tax reform debate, we need to know if what Trump wants to do is going to benefit himself, since he tends to do things that help him and not necessarily others.”

Some are under the impression that the crusade to mandate disclosure of Trump’s taxes is exclusively partisan, but the most recent polling revealed that 64 percent of Republicans – a clear majority, believe the returns should be tendered.

Especially problematic for President Trump, is that his own party is breaking ranks with him on the subject. Oklahoma Sen. James Lankford (R) is joining calls for President Trump to release his tax returns, telling crowds at a town hall Tuesday night in Claremore, Okla that “[Trump] promised he would.”

And GOP House members from the House Freedom CaucusMark Sanford, Ted Yoho and Justin Amash are all backing a Democratic measure to compel Trump to make the documents public. Some, who are not, are hearing about it from constituents – including Republican Senator Tom Cotton, who was booed at a town hall meeting Monday in Arkansas for defending Trump’s refusal to release the statements.

Donald Trump’s stance of treating his taxes as a classified government secret will continue to cast a pall on the legitimacy of his status as President.

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