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Trump's tax returns

NY Times says they have obtained Trumps tax returns. No huge surprise but he’s been losing money a whole lot. Not enough details in the returns to see any Russia connections however.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/09/27/us/donald-trump-taxes.html
There's a lot more than just Trump losing money.

This is a wonderful Oct surprise. :D

Donald J. Trump paid $750 in federal income taxes the year he won the presidency. In his first year in the White House, he paid another $750.

He had paid no income taxes at all in 10 of the previous 15 years — largely because he reported losing much more money than he made.

As the president wages a re-election campaign that polls say he is in danger of losing, his finances are under stress, beset by losses and hundreds of millions of dollars in debt coming due that he has personally guaranteed. Also hanging over him is a decade-long audit battle with the Internal Revenue Service over the legitimacy of a $72.9 million tax refund that he claimed, and received, after declaring huge losses. An adverse ruling could cost him more than $100 million.

And that looming debt means
... that he depends more and more on making money from businesses that put him in potential and often direct conflict of interest with his job as president.

This article offers an overview of The Times’s findings; additional articles will be published in the coming weeks.
Between that and Woodward's tapes, maybe the news cycle won't be dominated by Trump after all. :thumbsup:


I wonder if Forbes will reassess the conclusion Trump is a billionaire.
 
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NY Times gets a bunch of Trump tax records.
The New York Times has obtained tax-return data for President Trump and his companies that covers more than two decades. Mr. Trump has long refused to release this information, making him the first president in decades to hide basic details about his finances. His refusal has made his tax returns among the most sought-after documents in recent memory.

Among the key findings of The Times’s investigation:

Mr. Trump paid no federal income taxes in 11 of 18 years that The Times examined. In 2017, after he became president, his tax bill was only $750.

He has reduced his tax bill with questionable measures, including a $72.9 million tax refund that is the subject of an audit by the Internal Revenue Service.

Many of his signature businesses, including his golf courses, report losing large amounts of money — losses that have helped him to lower his taxes.

The financial pressure on him is increasing as hundreds of millions of dollars in loans he personally guaranteed are soon coming due.

Even while declaring losses, he has managed to enjoy a lavish lifestyle by taking tax deductions on what most people would consider personal expenses, including residences, aircraft and $70,000 in hairstyling for television.

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.

As president, he has received more money from foreign sources and U.S. interest groups than previously known. The records do not reveal any previously unreported connections to Russia.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/27/us/trump-taxes-takeaways.html

ETA: I missed SG's post.
 
There's a goldmine of corruption in those tax records!

His properties have become bazaars for collecting money directly from lobbyists, foreign officials and others seeking face time, access or favor; the records for the first time put precise dollar figures on those transactions.

And then there are the licensing deals he claimed he would not make when he was in office. Yet:
in his first two years in the White House, his revenue from abroad totaled $73 million. And while much of that money was from his golf properties in Scotland and Ireland, some came from licensing deals in countries with authoritarian-leaning leaders or thorny geopolitics — for example, $3 million from the Philippines, $2.3 million from India and $1 million from Turkey.
No wonder he loves authoritarian dictators. Puts a new light on Trump trying to get Kim to build Trump beach resorts in N Korea.
 
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750 bucks? Jesus Christ some upper middle class people pay that to have their taxes done!
 
Trump must be crapping bricks just about now. The timing couldn't be better. Expect a barrage of "Failing New York Times" tweets and a host of FOX pundits having apoplectic fits while foaming at the mouth. Good times. Good times.

No wonder Trump fought so hard to hide his tax returns. They reveal him to be what we always knew him to be: a fake, charlatan, hoax, liar, sham, fraud, huckster, imposter...
 
Just a pity so many of the trumpkins won't read this. All they'll hear, safe in their bubble, is "fake news got tax retunrs ,found nothing about russia or stomry daniels!11" ad infinitum.

More on-topic, I'm about halfway through the article and it's a wonderful read so far.
 
I wonder how many people who voted for Trump believing he was a successful businessman who would know how to run the US economy successfully will feel cheated? He has claimed he was responsible for our great economy (when we know he inherited a vibrant and growing one) and it's gone to hell in a handbasket. Will any of them finally ask themselves "He isn't the mogul he told us he was? He lied to us about that." Or will they, again, just believe what he tells them and handwave away the NYT story as 'fake news' and believe what Dear Leader tells them as the good little cultists they are? Sadly, I fear the vast majority of them will keep their MAGA hats on, wave their flags, attend their rallies, swig another Bud Lite, smoke another cigarette, and vote for Dear Leader.
 
Prediction: it will come as little surprise to most, and the faithful will care not a whit.

The New York and eventually federal prosecutors might. What I bet it shows is that Trump undervalued properties for tax purposes and overvalued them securing loans. So he likely committed bank and tax fraud.
 
It's good to have confirmation and details about just how badly he's doing:) .

I wonder how many people who voted for Trump believing he was a successful businessman who would know how to run the US economy successfully will feel cheated? He has claimed he was responsible for our great economy (when we know he inherited a vibrant and growing one) and it's gone to hell in a handbasket. Will any of them finally ask themselves "He isn't the mogul he told us he was? He lied to us about that." Or will they, again, just believe what he tells them and handwave away the NYT story as 'fake news' and believe what Dear Leader tells them as the good little cultists they are? Sadly, I fear the vast majority of them will keep their MAGA hats on, wave their flags, attend their rallies, swig another Bud Lite, smoke another cigarette, and vote for Dear Leader.
I think they'll be more like "okay, this is bad, but he's still a good president because x", with or without "oh, and what about...". Confirmation bias and sunk cost fallacy will kick in and some Trump-friendly news in their favourite echo chambers will help with the cognitive dissonance.

Then again, I suppose it will at least affect some people, and you never know how many of those you really need to tip a state or even a whole election.
 
Oh of course it won't make a difference. His cult members will wait until their leader decides which excuse/distraction to use and/or there's some pettifogging meaningless nitpick to go on about.
 
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Three takeaways:

1) Trump pays zero in federal income taxes because he's smart.
2) No Russian collusion.
3) The NYT is a third-rate, dying paper. Who edited this story? Exact quote:

His share of the profits through the end of 2018 totaled $176.5 million , with depreciation factored in.

Sad!
 
Trump must be crapping bricks just about now. The timing couldn't be better. Expect a barrage of "Failing New York Times" tweets and a host of FOX pundits having apoplectic fits while foaming at the mouth. Good times. Good times.

No wonder Trump fought so hard to hide his tax returns. They reveal him to be what we always knew him to be: a fake, charlatan, hoax, liar, sham, fraud, huckster, imposter...

You left off corrupt.
 
Trump just fell back on his "Fake news" excuse. He's also complaining that the IRS treats him "very, very badly" and that he'll be happy to share his taxes as soon as they're no longer "under audit". Seems to me we've heard that before.
 

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