Trump Files for an Extension on his 2016 Taxes

This Saturday, a White House official confirmed that President Trump filed for an extension on his 2016 taxes, however, it was not stated when the extension was filed or what the reason was. Trump has declined to release his previous returns because he claims that he is under audit.

The extension was first reported by NBC. It is possible that the returns could provide insight into Trump’s conflicts of interest and financial ties. The situation is of much speculation; Trump is the first president in decades to not release his tax returns.

In a recent interview with The Economist, Trump was asked, “If you do need Democratic support for your tax plan, your ideal tax plan, and the price of that the Democrats say is for you to release your tax returns, would you do that?” Trump replied by saying “I don’t know”, he argued that no one cares about his tax returns besides reporters. He says that he will release that at some point, but it may be after he is finished with his presidency. Trump stated, in regards to his tax returns, that he is “proud of them actually” and says he “did a good job.” Eventually, Hope Hicks, the White House Director of Strategic Communications, interjected the interview.

Steven Mnuchin, the Treasury Secretary, told reporters in regard to the returns during a White House press briefing in April that, “The President has no intention– the President has released plenty of information and I think has given more final disclosure than anyone else.”

This May, Trump’s lawyers released a statement that asserted that within the past 10 years, Trump’s federal tax returns, “with few exceptions”, do not show any income from Russian sources. In the letter, lawyers also asserted that the returns demonstrate no debt owed to or interest paid to Russian lenders by Trump or the entities he controls in Russian businesses.

However, nothing could be independently confirmed in the letter because Trump has still not released the statements. An outside lawyer who analyzed the letter, deemed it “unhelpful” if its goal was to clear up any controversy regarding the Russian dilemma.

This past March, MSNBC acquired two pages of the President IRS 1040 form that showed in 2005, he paid $38 million in federal income taxes on an income of $150 million, however, these are the only two pages that have been obtained so far.

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