By Jeffrey Rubin (NEWSMAX)
White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany told reporters on Thursday that President Donald Trump’s taxes are still under audit by the IRS. He won’t release them until the audit is completed, she said, according to a report on the website Axios.
As the news organization reported, Trump has claimed for years that his taxes are under “routine audit.” His fight to keep them from prying eyes has led all the way to the Supreme Court.
On Thursday, in a pair of 7-2 rulings, the Supreme Court ruled that Manhattan prosecutor Cy Vance has the legal right to subpoena records from Trump’s financial institutions, while also rejecting, for the moment at least, House effort to subpoena similar records.
In an exchange between a reporter and McEnany, the press secretary took the position that the records, court rulings notwithstanding, are not ready to be released to anyone.
The president, whatever the court says, can release his taxes whenever he likes. Why shouldn’t Americans believe at this point that the president isn’t trying to hide something?” a reporter asked.
McEnany replied: “The media’s been asking this question for four years, and for four years, the president has said the same thing, his taxes are under audit, and when they’re no longer under audit, he will release them.”
McEnany also argued that the court’s majority decision gave the president the right to challenge subpoenas “on any grounds permitted by state law.”
“The justices did not rule against him, in fact it was a unanimous opinion saying that this needs to go back to the district court, and they even recognized that the president has an ample arsenal of arguments that he can make,” she said.
Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, both appointed by Trump to the high court, aligned with liberal members on the 7-2 ruling.
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, reacting Thursday to the court ruling that Trump must turn over his tax returns to a New York grand jury, took a shot at Congress, The Washington Examiner reported.
“The only thing I do agree on in that report is when things go to Congress, they tend to get leaked, and when things go to a grand jury, they don’t,” he told CNBC, according to the Examiner report.
